Act 1: The Death of a God

Chapter 6 - Kilegros

by Emmanuel Ordway

Chapter 5 here.

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The group made their down the cramped corridors of the docking station before the halls expanded into a large loading station, multiple automated steel arms using pincers to pick large crates up and set them into holes in walls, Shaikyns standing on catwalks overhead watching the arms, Human slaves beside them tending to every need or want, some Shaikyns arguing with dock workers while others were busy paying the docking fee.

“I can help y'all over here.” A Shaikyn wearing a dirty grey suit waved the crew down, the man standing at a grey metal terminal, his back arms typing on a second terminal behind him.

The group walked over to him and his back arms reached over his shoulder, replacing his front hands on the front terminal and allowing his front hands to grab the data pad from his hip.

“Just docked? That would be a twenty high-credit payment. Who’s the captain here?”   He looked at the group, his voice turning to one of surprised giddy, as he saw the two towering Shaikyns and rightfully assumed them to be Eonvym. Eonvym meant royalty, and royalty meant more pay.

“I am,” Ahri stepped forward and raised her hand quickly to capture the man’s attention. “And if I remember correctly, the standard docking fee is ten credits, not high-credits.”

Taken aback by Ahri’s knowledge, the Shaikyn responded back nervously, his usual plot of dragging more payment out of crews being uncovered. “Well, that is the standard but due to current situations, the price has been raised for the week.”

“Oh really?” Ahri put her front hands on her hips and stared the dock worker down, even if neither of them could see each other’s eyes. “And what would this situation be?”

Fictillis and Kilegros looked at each other, the two wondering if the other knew what Ahri’s plan here was.

“Well,” The Shaikyn clasped his hands together and his fingers locked together before fiddling with each other. “The Son is here so. . You know, we need to raise the prices for protection reasons.”

“To protect the Son,” Ahri laughed and threw her hands into the air. “And how would paying extra protect the Son? Give him some more money to slap some more gold on his suit?”

“It helps deter people from docking? I don’t know ma’am; I don’t make the rules!”

Ahri bit back her tongue before reaching up to her neck and tugging on a wire from her suit, extending it out to the dock worker. The worker breathed a silent sigh of relief before taking a wire from her suit and connecting it to his, a quick projection flashed from his suit that showed twenty yellow lines quickly line up before disappearing.

“Better refuel the ship while you’re at it,” Ahri spat as she began to walk past him, the wire automatically disconnecting and retreating back into her suit as she muttered under her breath. “That's a whole month's payment for cargo shipping.”

“Is she usually like this?” Kilegros asked Fictillis quietly, the two a few paces behind the pissed off Shaikyn.

“Can’t remember a time when she wasn’t.” Fictillis gave a slight chuckle as they walked out of the docking area, his demeanor uncaring for the angry captain as they reached the next part of the station which was much larger.

Kilegros looked out into the city in front of them, as beautiful as it was expansive. The station appeared to sit in the shape of a diamond, the city stretching from wall to wall as skyscrapers and buildings intersected with one another while the up to one side of the city was the down to the next. Glittering glass buildings for the elite class lined one side of the city, their skyscrapers jagged and beautiful which gave quite the contrast to the dull stamped metal buildings of the poor Shaikyn side.  

“Almost compares to Mars, just missing the greenery and water.” Kilegros stepped forward on this thin catwalk they stood on, gently gripping the railing and kept looking up into the city, watching the many small shuttles zoom around the area, filled with people on their way to work for the start of the calendar day.

“You’ve been to Mars?” Fictillis wondered as he looked up into the city as well, standing next to Kilegros.

“You haven’t? You’re Eonvym aren't you? They should have sent you there to train. At the academy.” Kilegros looked at Fictillis, wondering how this Eonvym snuck through the Empire for so long.

“Guess I was too good to go to any academy. Sent straight to the Shipping Line Wars, made a few bad choices, escaped and haven’t been searched for since. Guess I’m just a ghost in the system. I mean, technically that’s what we are. Ahri, Tobias and I, that is.” Fictillis nodded back at Kilegros, smirking under his mask at the idea of being too good for any proper Eonvym training.

“Shipping Line Wars? You. . . would have been a child when those happened. How did you even get permitted to fight without any train-” Kilegros was cut off by a distant voice, his curiosity cut off for the moment. 

“Hey! Dumb and dumber! Get over here!” Ahri shouted out, being further down the catwalk, now standing on solid concrete ground next to one of the small taxi shuttles like the ones zooming around the city.

The two made their way over to her, both left with questions about the other as Ahri got in the pilot’s seat, the two Eonvym getting in wherever they could fit.

“So, who are we going to meet?” Kilegros asked Ahri from the back, his head leaned down to fit in the shuttle.

“The Runners. They have a big stake in the black market.” Ahri answered curtly, not caring to give more information willingly.

“I know who the Runners are,” Kilegros scoffed while looking out the window to see more of the city. “Who are we gonna meet?”

“Whoever runs the market here stupid.” Fictillis spoke up, laughing softly to himself.

“Thanks for the answer, now keep your mouth shut before I freeze it shut.” Kilegros narrowed his eyes as he grew increasingly annoyed.

He watched the buildings pass as they entered a crowd of other flying ships, occasionally speeding up or down where they had to, eventually pulling away from the invisible road and entering an up-side-down town, this area built to be more suburban as it led to the city where they could see something big was happening. They kept flying while Kilegros wondered how they knew where to go, his eyes wandering to Ahri and seeing her suit plugged into the ship itself, possibly giving her directions he could not hear.

Kilegros leaned back into his seat and sighed softly, his mind thinking to look for any other new curiosities as it slowly and unwillingly slipped away into darkness.

Kilegros woke up on a barren red rock, sitting up while looking down at his hands. His hands were coated in blood, stained a deep red as he began to panic and jumped to his feet. He backed up to the edge of the rock and swung his head around, seeing mountains of bodies around as a storm raged around his setting. Rain smashed against his frigid body as he looked up to a distant mountain top and noticed a figure.

He could see someone standing defiantly upon a red mountaintop, looking to the sky. They held two swords, both made of silver while fixed in a combative pose, their arms and swords down to the side with their chest forward as if to leap at a target. Their golden, royal clothes were torn and tattered and what seemed to be the remnants of a golden crown rested upon their head. He then looked to the sky and could see a massive thunderstorm where a bright light pierced the louds. Spikes of jagged electricity and fire slowly expanded across the sky from the bright red light, here to bring retribution.

Kilegros woke up as the ship parked on the ground, sitting up and finding himself to be in a massive crowd of people, all cheering and jumping for some kind of celebration.

“Where are we?” He questioned tiredly as he looked forward at the two Shaikyns.

“Come on, let’s go. Looks like some kind of parade.” Ahri shrugged as she opened the doors, forcing people around them to move while they stepped out into the loud crowd.

The three met up on the left side of the ship while Ahri was looking around the crowd and the two Eonvym stood above it. The Eonvym moved forward, parting the sea of people with Ahri walking behind them.

“What do you see?” She called out to them,  shouting over the crowd.

“A parade, as you guessed.” Fictillis answered while the two Eonvym broke to the front and could all see clearly as the large parade passed by, most Shaikyns and slaves stepping aside for the two, assuming them to be some level of royalty just for being Eonvym.

They all watched hovering ships and floats pass by slowly with their inhabitants waving to the crowd, just before a ship with a flat top passed by with a group of people playing instruments and vocalist singing praising songs. As this float passed by, a new one came with the ship wrapped in golden colors of royalty and bright flashes of gems and jewels. On top of the hill of rubies on the ship stood three Eonvym. The Son stood proudly at the top, wearing a long chain cloak of gold, his front arm’s hands behind his back and overlapping each other, long golden claws on each finger while his back arms also rested barely above his front arm’s hands. His proud chest presented various medals and other awards, the largest emblem of gold at the center of his chest symbolizing his status as the Emperor’s son, his suit all a golden color mixed with silver lining. His sharp helmet presented himself much taller with two horns protruding from top of the helmet’s skull, curving like sharp daggers threatening to pierce the sky just above his head, and the holographic eyes of the helmet glowed a faint purple, seeming to stare at everyone at once. Next to him stood two of his guards, their parade armour golden like their master’s, also having the silver lines with colorful feathers running down their skull helmets. In their grasp were two long silver spears in opposite hands to each other, the spears being as tall as the Shaikyns in the crowd, besides the Eonvym.

The Son occasionally looked around at the crowd, waving lazily, but once the three were in his view, his gaze locked onto them and never relented. His golden mask’s crooked line where his mouth would be seemed to grin at them menacingly while his purple eyes stared into their souls. It seemed like anything he desired to know about them, he was searching deeply for.

“Um. . y’all see that right?” Ahri wondered while a mixed feeling of fear and confusion began to rise in her gut.

“Yeah.” Kilegros nodded, fear rising in himself as well since he couldn’t look away from the Son. Kilegros' eyes began to have a sense of tunnel vision on the Son.

Soon the feeling broke, his vision feeling like it widened but once he looked away, all he could see was the same darkness that had just been enclosed around the Son.

“What’s happening here? Ahri? Fictillis?” He called out, his voice shaking a bit as the unnatural fear did not waver, only continuing to twist his gut.

In front of him, a figure was illuminated in the darkness, the Son's golden body glowing through the darkness as if making an area of sanctuary. 

“Kilegros,” An overwhelming sense of peace washed over Kilegros while the Son slowly walked forward, still holding his hands behind his back. “You died, did you not?”

“What do you want from me?” He couldn’t fight the wave of emotion and his words of anger slipped into being soft.

“No no no,” The son laughed, his voice rich and silky and Kilegros could feel his body betray him, trusting in the Son while the back of his mind screamed to fight. “What do you want from me, Kilegros?”

“Don’t you try and pull some reverse shit on me!” Kilegros’ anger breached his calm demeanor for a second again before his mind was overtaken with peace again.

“No need for such language Kilegros!” The Son laughed softly, his body circling Kilegros’ as he was inspected by the prince. “I know who all of you are, and I truly am intrigued with what you have done. Not many who die get to return, young Eonvym.”

The aura changed suddenly, now Kilegros was overtaken with fear. He spun around and began to run, occasionally glancing backwards in the darkness, only seeing the Son appear closer each time, the Eonvym not seeming to change stance. Suddenly, Kilegros slammed into the Son, rebounding onto his back with a grunt while the Son stayed above him, unmoved.

“Why do you run from me?” The Son’s mask seemed to wave slightly, as if the air just in front of his mask was being boiled while two long black slits pierced through the air just in front of his eyes and expanded into two narrowed black eyes.

“What is that?” Kilegros raised his hand above his own face in a vain attempt to defend himself while the Son loomed over him.

Ignoring the Eonvym’s question, the Son continued.

“You run out of fear of me Kilegros. There is no need for fear as I bring you an offering, one you should take some time to truly consider.” The Son held his hand out to Kilegros, offering to help him off from the dark floor.

“What kind of offering?” Kilegros watched his hand for a moment before hesitantly taking it as the aura turned from fright to wonder as the Son continued to twist Kilegros’ emotions.

The Son pulled the Eonvym to his feet as the world changed around them. Kilegros watched as the darkness grew bright and the two stood at the beginning of a dark ocean with the dim horizon in the distance, the closest Kresh could get to having some form of sunlight on the planet before Jupiter moved to block the sun.

“Do you hear it?” The Son waved his hand past Kilegros and away from the water. “I do. A family who lost their son. Now he’s found and been brought back. Celebrations are in order, I do believe.”

Kilegros saw the dim land, taking note of the tall jungle trees and overall diversity of wildlife. Soon the horizon blackened and the world was plunged into another seemingly never ending night of darkness.

“We’re on Kresh. .” Kilegros said with a sense of longing in his voice as the lights of a distant house turned on, the place hidden loosely by the trees.

“Indeed. I offer the chance to go back, to see them again. I know it has been a long time but I am sure your family would be ecstatic to see you.” The Son looked at Kilegros as his black eyes seemed to widen while his mask’s grin grew bigger.

“That. . How? You know I can’t see them again.”

“Just bring yourself to Mars. Give me the time there to settle this conflict. Don’t cause trouble, and I can give you what you want,” The Son leaned forward and moved his front right hand from his back, taking one of his golden claws and jabbing it into Kilegros’ chest. “What you truly want.”

Kilegros looked at his chest where the golden claw was poking, finding the air from his longs gone as a black void appeared from the claw and began to swallow his body in the void. He looked up to the Son’s sinister black eyes before opening his mouth in a silent scream as he was completely taken by the void.

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Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed.

The next post will be a duo chapter post again since they're both fairly short.