Chronicles of The Omniverse Archived Cerulean Coast

‘Am I good enough..?’

Click. Click.

The sound of metal ‘tinked’ together softly like little bells with the movements of the woman wearing the proud armor. Her eyes were locked straight ahead to her destination. She knew by now where the beacon had been leading her to.

Click.

‘Will I be a good enough to be a paladin one day..?’

She came upon the devastated slowly, her sea blue hues steeled against what had befallen to her comrades. She walked slowly now, trying to find the source of the distress beacon.

‘Yes child. If you train hard enough, and follow your studies..’

She heard the faintest of sounds, turning her head in the direction to the fallen man. She knew, even at this distance, that he would not make it for more than a few minutes more.

‘And pray..’

She crossed the distance and knelt down beside him, strands of her blonde hair enclosing her face as she leaned forward. She gently reached to cup his cheek.

‘Then one day, you will carry the burden of saving the world from the darkness upon your shoulders..’

“Do not be afraid, brother.” Her voice was even and calming. She could see the fear on his face. They were taught not to fear death, that the light would greet them. But how could one not be afraid? “Is there anything I can do for you?”
 
At first, David thought he had already died. The fair-faced woman walking towards him was something out of a dream, her plate-mail gleaming in the golden rays of the dusk. She was one of the saints, a Valkyrie of some pagan faith sent to carry him away to a distant land...

...but closer inspection revealed the truth. Familiar litanies engraved the pauldrons of her armor, a wingspread raven cresting her cuirass. Not a spirit - a paladin. A sister.

She leaned close. Her flax hair ensconced her face like a halo, the oceanic blue of her eyes full of pity, full of kindness. He had never seen anything so beautiful. Her hand touched his cheek and he shivered. Dammit, David, focus. She was about to take your place in that tower. Brief her. Prepare her for the evil ahead. Be a knight.

"Three of them," he rasped, "shapeshifters, man-eaters, sentient. I would tell you to wait for backup, but they have hostages..." A soft grunt. He pressed harder at the wound in his side. "...villagers, from Teuscen... you have to..."

He swallowed. The ringing in his ears crescendoed, spots of yellow blooming in his vision. He suddenly felt claustrophobic in his armor.

"Help me... help me take this off..." Dumb, metalclad fingers scrambled at the latches to his helmet. "...please, I don't want to die... with this damn thing on..."
 
With gentle and steady hands, she reached to help him unlatch his helmet, pulling it away from the man's head once it was loosened. Death was here to take him now into the peaceful sleep that would lead him to the next life. She knew there was a duty for her to uphold, to protect those who remained, but she felt compelled to stay with her fallen brother until he no longer drew breath. Whatever waited within would still be there when she got there, and seeing the carnage here, she doubt many if any survived. She would face those creatures alone.

"Go with the light, Brother. You did what you could. Rest now. I'll take over from here." She said quietly.
 
He breathed deep, then slow, then barely at all. His hands, numb with the chill of death, took his sister's wrist and lay what looked like a one-shot pistol into her palm. She would recognize it immediately - an air-drop flare gun. The light on its side beamed red. When it flashed green, whatever she fired at would be the drop point for a suit of monastic power armor. David must have called in an auxiliary suit some time earlier when the situation became dire.

"Seven..." he rasped, "...minutes... and you'll have it..." He growled against the darkness seeping into his brain, pushing off death's embrace for a few seconds longer. "Tell them I died... in battle... don't tell them I tried... to run away..." Fresh tears trailed his cheeks. "...don't tell them..."

Then his breath left him and he went still. The monotone heartbeat of the distress signal played on beside his corpse. Blip blip blip.

The crushed door leading into tower beckoned her, the darkness within ominous and absolute.
 
The woman closed her eyes and squeezed his hand gently as his life left him. She said a swift prayer before gently placing his hand gently on his chest and slowly standing. The breeze touched her face as she stared at the road she took to get here. It was empty, save for the trees that swayed with that same breeze. No one else would be coming. Slowly, she turned to face the ominous tower, the darkness the sharp contract to the light reflecting off her armor. Seven minutes, he had said. Would she survive that long?

She began to walk forward, drawing her long sword from its sheath while keeping the other around the flare gun.

She had no choice. There was a blight against the light, and even if it meant her death she had to face the darkness alone. She entered the tower.
 
Into the Dark the paladin came, into the nameless dark which swallows the light. In order to see in the tower, the paladin would likely need to fix a roundlight to some part of her body or gear - on the pommel of her sword, her flare gun, or on her breastplate or helmet. The miniaturized spotlight would allow her considerable visibility in the otherwise abyssal watchtower.

The place was a wreck. Furniture lay splintered on the floor next to spent shotgun casings, moth-chewn carpets lining the cold, dusty stone. Paintings mounted the wall, replicas of Evequist classics. Tarko period, mostly. Here was Saint Absolon spearing the side of a towering demon, his hands charred and blistered where they gripped the lance. There was Saint Lemeux tangled in the black roots of Gorn, his torch seering the trunk of the man-eating willow tree...

Beneath this painting lay an armored torso. Only a torso. Where the limbs and head should have been were gory craters leaking rivers of dark blood into the stone. There was a Lawkeeper on the belt, several clips of ammunition, and a few potions. The crest of the breastplate bore the Selenite Raven.

A thrush of air beside her, a low chuckle in the shadows.

"Who is this?" The voice was young, masculine. "Another knight-in-shining-armor? Come to save the day?"

"A woman, this one," a different voice now, feminine, sultry, "are there woman paladins?"

"Of course, Sela." He sounded chastising. "There've always been women knights in the Order. Don't you pay attention to any of mother's lessons?"

"You know I don't, Vinar," a flirtatious chuckle. The paladin wouldn't quite be able to pin where the voices were centered, but she feel a certain coldness around her limbs, her waist. She was being watched.

"She's lovely, isn't she?"

"Lovely. Beautiful, even."

"Beautiful... what I wouldn't give to have those eyes..."

Something stirred in the shadows behind her.
 
The light had been fixed to her breastplate and she clicked it on now. The hairs on her neck rose at the sound of the voices, and she stood stock still as she listened. Two distinct voices. But where was the third?

She barely listened to the chatter they spoke among themselves, instead was listening for movement. Visibility was low. When something behind her stirred, she turned with her blade facing that direction and prepared for a blow.
 
The device fixed to her breastplate cut a neat knife of light through the absolute dark, dust and airspeck swimming in the beam. Roughly twenty feet away stood a splintered coffee table whereupon sat a man, narrow on the shoulders, the hips, with a handsome, angular face and bright white eyes. His skin was ebon black and glossed in the glow of the paladin’s roundlight. Whatever he was made of, it was not skin.

“Well met, good knight,” he smiled, his voice oiled and sweet, “my name is Vinar. I hope you don’t mind if I eat while we talk.”

In his fingers were the remains of a human skull - the flesh stripped from the nose down. With the paladin watching, Vinar plucked a blue eyeball from its socket and popped it onto his mouth like a dumpling. He chewed thoughtfully, swallowed, then smiled.

“Would you like some?” he offered the skull to her. His left iris, previously milky white, was now the same shade of blue of the eyeball he had just consumed.
 
The seasoned warrior gazed over to the monster that stood in front of her, her face set in an emotionless stone against the gory scene set before the woman. All the while he spoke, she kept an ear out, waiting for the other two to make an appearance.

"I do not mind, though I'm pretty sure my brother you're eating would appreciate it if I made sure that was your last meal." She had to stall for time. As well trained as she was, she was undoubtedly out matched in this fight alone. Slowly, she took one step, narrowing her gap to the darkened creature. Some how, she found the strength not to flinch at the sound of the shape shifter munching on the eyeball.

"Pardon me if I decline. I'm afraid I have a bit more of a refined palate than the flesh of men." She mentally went over the items she had brought with her before her journey. Her mission before hadn't accosted her much of her own resources, but she had not anticipated on being put back into the field so quickly in such an urgent call. If need, she would have to partake in what little items her brother-in-arms left behind on his torso by the painting. If she could get to it in time, that is.

Stall for more time....

She gazed over her shoulder for a moment before looking back at Vinar. "Something tells me you've something to tell me, though. Well? I'm listening."
 
"Ah, a mannered woman. How refreshing," Vinar grinned wide, his huge teeth stained with gore and blood. "Those last two knights would have none of our conversation - all fire and fury with swords flashing. Not good representative of your Order, truly." He chuckled. "Nor were they half so pleasing to look at as you are, demoiselle..."

"Oh please Vinar, stop flirting," another voice soothed from the shadows about ten feet to the paladin's right. Should she look, she would find a second figure - all black as before - this one decidedly more feminine in shape and voice. She smiled, her teeth inhumanly large and white. "You may call me Sela, darling. Would you shake my hand?" Though she was beyond reach, she extended her arm. The black etch of her skin curdled around the wrist until it resembles a freckled human hand, pink and plump. "Or perhaps you'll shake this one instead?" The limb rippled once more. This time her hand was fair and pale, the fingers neatly manicured. Sela inspected it, beaming and vain. "I rather like this one. I just took it last week from the constable's wife in Teuscen. She was a fat, jiggly old thing, but she has such lovely hands, wouldn't you agree?"

Vinar's came from behind, closer this time, though still beyond her sword's length. "Your arrogance won't charm her, Sela. She is a warrior. Clearly she deserves someone of a more sturdy constitution..."

Sela's voice, closer than before. They drew nearer with barb. "Warrior or no, she is still a woman... and a woman likes to feel beautiful."

A hiss, a rush of hot breath on her neck, directly behind her.

"And she is beautifuuulll...."
 
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