Walking upon an almost barren path, one slow, steady step followed the next beneath that nagging whisper in the backs of mens' minds that trembled in an echo of primal fear. There was something to this night that men were never meant to know. There was something out there that they simply should never wish to know.
At last one step would fall, only to find itself accompanied by a sudden, still silence, as the air itself seemed frozen in muted apprehension. The whisper that would soon follow, came in soft, clipped words, neither rushed nor slowed, "What do you want?"
"You can feel it in the air, can't you?" the voice hinted a strange mix of pity and amusement whispering against the calmed words.
"I feel much and I feel little. You should know that best of all," There was an almost dead whisper to the words, a hollowness that echoed of loss, pain that could never truly heal.
There was a slight quirk of amusement to rise in that voice at the figures' simple refusal to answer beyond the vague before it responded, "You can feel that they escaped. The Abyss binds them not."
"I knew it the moment the deed was done. My words were chosen to be ignored."
"Just as you chose to ignore our laws."
"I chose to follow the duty I swore myself to," a slight flare of bitter anger welled past the empty echo of the voice, as if gifting it for the first time with the touch of life.
"And placed your allegiance with your beloved mortals above that with your brethren," anger beget anger as the response bit back with ill restrained venom.
"They at least have earned it."
"As they prey to Hell's whispers," it was spat back, perhaps before thought echoed into the mind
"You speak as if there was never a number of our brethren to fall in similiar fashion," there was an edge of triumph in the voice, that rose before falling again to bitter sorrow, "Though I wish it had never come to pass."
A pause rose into the stilled night for a lingering moment before at last the voice responded, "They will rise again you know."
"Aye. And Champions will again cast them down."
A sigh slipped back unseen lips as one could almost feel the slow shake of the head, "They will rise in a world that knows nothing of their touch, their history, their corruption."
There was a tremor of sorrow that welled up in the voice the responded, before it broken into the slowly cooling summer air, "The champions will still rise. They will find a way, though their world will know agonies beyond what this world knew."
"They will need a guide."
"... Why do you taunt me with this?" a fire broke into that voice, a fierce, burning thing that arose past shadowed lips, "By our Heaven's decree was I stripped of what I was. By your own hand was I cast from my home. I can do NOTHING beyond wander these lands amongst the mortals I so championed."
"We are willing to send you there."
"...Why?"
"Because we can do nothing. We will not interfere... But you can."
"And if I go?" there was suspicion in that voice, uncertainty, tinged with a last glimmer of hope.
"You cannot return. The portal is one way and one way alone. You must choose Tyreal. Is aiding them against the Prime Evils worth leaving behind everything you know?"
As those words whispered into the night, reality itself slowly twisted and rippled before the frozen man before a piercing stab of liquid crimson poured out. It took but a moment to swell out, an almost oval opening ringed by twisting threads of energy. A portal.
There was but a moments collection, before the whispered voice of the once Archangel rose up, "Yes."
No hesitation, no pause, his steps rose and ventured forth as he soon found himself stepping into....
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(Posted Wed, 06 Oct 2004 05:40)
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らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
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