Adrift

[Caira Ayryn]

Adrift (1/3)

Blackness. She felt it intertwine and consume her soul, it was a sensation she would not soon forget. For a split, disjointing second, she felt an immense affliction as she came to. Any sensation she felt was met with a sharp pain, splitting through her forehead and into the back of her skull. An intense pounding, one that matched the beat of her heartbeat. Unable to think, Caira winced with pain, but through an open eye she recognized darkness. Her neck jolted suddenly as she inhaled a hesitant breath that reminded her craving lungs of the sensation and fulfillment of air. She drew in a heavy breath and found that she was surrounded by infinite nothingness, there was still clearly air to stretch her lungs, as she had ascertained. The female continued to regain her composure and realized her body was horizontal, yet, gravity did not protest to weigh or orbit any surface or ground. How did I get here?

Any attempt to excogitate how she had appeared in her present state was denied by a sort of blockage in her mind, and the pain increased as she attempted to recall the events. Perhaps a polar form of instillation derailed her memory. A lifetime was not something someone soon forgot, and hers had been replaced with an acute headache, she was definitely alive. Still, her dubious theory seemed infallible at the time as she desired to believe she was not dead and the pain was evidence enough to dissuade her from believing so.

As she continued a sweep of her surroundings, she felt no culpability nor onus, and the lack of gravity evoked awareness to her own unencumbered body. Caira began by listing the facts: I'm definitely unconscious, I am unable to recall what I was doing before this.. But if I am not, and I'm trapped in some sort of illusion, things look pretty bleak. Poison can cause hallucinations.. It's possible that a poison is the cause of.. All this. Her eyes met the darkness before her, she was within the Mouth of the Devil.

"Strange though, it feels as though I am drifting in an altered course of reality.." She spoke to the nothingness, to the darkness, and just to hear the familiar ring of her own voice purr to her ears, she felt a bit of comfort in the familiar timbre. She accounted, to the best of her ability, all of her astute senses and to this place which seemed to hold onto her, without any evidence of a physical grasp. As Caira sighed, exhuming her thoughts and delving into the point of pain, she leaned back to see if the nothingness would warp to the outline of her imagination, she found a strange sense of support suddenly tingle, as though there was density in this emptiness yet. This shock reached her breath which was mildly obstructed with the accelerated rhythm of panic and consternation.

"Humm..." She felt the agony in her skull lessen with the vibration of the tone, and then she squirmed, and turned upside down with a small struggle. Her hair tumbled downward suspiciously. Perhaps that meant the trick was up. But it was this that finally told her, "I'm not trapped at all!"

A gale force wind rippled from the nothingness, and her clothes and loose garments shook at the force. The tsunami wave of wind caught her off guard, and spun her around a bit, but she was sure she had imagined it, because it was such a surreal feeling. Instantaneously, as though she had strum the right tune, a light brightened the darkness. It appeared as a pathway to a coruscant star, only further convincing her that she was no longer conscious. But with a flash in the starless sky, a beacon of exalted cynosure was streaming with light before her. She faced the unparagoned being, upside down. When she saw it did not have eyes, her own averted from his face.

Omni..present? She assumed as the bright silhouette had introduced itself. She suspected there was something more to it but listened wholeheartedly. Omnilium.. And he can create fearless beings? Well.. Incentive to be fearless, with an irrevocable reason.. Caira attempted to understand, and was mightily intrigued by the being's words.

"Waiting for...?" Her voice trailed off as he had vanished by the time she could compose her question and allow it to stream from her lips.

[Caira Ayryn]

A New Beginning, Tomb Within the Nexus 2/3

Caira gasped for breath as her ribs crashed into the ground, which was strange because its mere existence soothed and reassured her of life once more. In its crippling effect it had on her with its protrusion, it was strangely accepted with her own arrival. There was an instantaneous change in scenery. From black to white, as if life were that simple, but the contrast was notable. The room certainly glowed enough to rouse Caira, whom had just fallen into the floor of the Nexus, and heard the rushing of water and a stampede of feet and a comment made by a distant voice about the eight gates leading into other Verses. A trickle of pain split in her skull, and down her spine. The source was the heavy sense of gravity immobilizing her limbs, she opened her eyes seeking to conclude her inundated confusion.

Her purple eyes searched the room with awe. It was marvelously colorless, the light filled her intrinsic sense of sight. But her movement seemed somewhat lethargic, and her neck couldn't turn quick enough when she discerned a strange noise that seemed to oscillate and shriek in the same synchronized rhythm, she had a quick second to analyze her surroundings because the noise grew as it neared her. The great white room had expanded before her, as though she was in the belly of a pearl, with eight gates far in the distance, marking the perimeter and she had been transported to the very middle. There was a legion of soldiers, she identified by their analogous uniforms, all standing in attack position, with their weapons and stances all aimed at her.

Caira's eyes widened with shock, her stance became low, structured and ready for any advance the blockade would offer.

"That's not-!" Shouted one of the men, whose height presumed authority over the rest, before something was thrown in her direction that cut off his speech. A blurred shape billowed forward, she could not make it out, but she darted backward in an enthralled frenzy, disregarding gravity's cruel burden. She had barely moved fast enough, when the ground grew black beneath her, and the disk thrown had become a shadow-like puddle, the energy emitted from it was threatening, a fear unlike anything else became her.

Every muscle in her body could be felt with rigid horror. She was staring at the shadow of an ending and yet.. remained less afraid, despite sensing it was the ultimate threat as it exuded a heinous energy, one that stirred her soul. Promptly, something fell, about the size of a person, roughly in the blur of motion, appearing as a bound coffin, and had been transported to the same location she had landed, next to the fountain. The centralized location seemed to entail danger, confusion, and capture. It was a corpse.

Caira was captivated by the events, and quickly dodged out of the way of the cage set by the soldiers as she did not seem to be their primary concern. Before their eyes the person whom had fallen from the transient location was captured by falling into the circular puddle. Before she knew, she witnessed a tragedy that evoked the same pain that split her skull. The expression construed by the man was only anguish and fear, which was warped with a forlorn destitution she had never before witnessed. It caused an empathetic response to induce within her, she almost reached out, but found her toes on the edge of the perimeter, and found herself only able to watch in horror as he seemed to be eaten alive. It vanished, having consumed its nourishment, and a wave of relief and shock cause her to nearly collapse in its density, as the danger had not engulfed her with its disappearance.

"What was that!?" She exclaimed, for she had no words to describe the threat that had nearly enwrapped her. Some of the soldiers eyed her with dismay, she continued "Who are you, and why did you do that!" Caira spouted out before her mind cognitively reassessed the situation.

Their leader, List, scoffed with authority, hidden under a shielding face-mask, after just praising some of his men for the capture of their target. "It would seem that you are new here, this is the Nexus, a place where Primes respawn. That man was one of the most inimical criminals, one that deserved a fate worse than death, and so, he was banished to the Underverse. You have a lot to learn before you can question our authority." The man warned in a deep voice.

Caira found a thread, submerging in her thoughts, an answer to the question of immortality, So that was it, Omni offers freedom, but not without consequence. Not of this kind. She had assumed the twist of immortality to be a tad different, Banishment from this deathless place... What did it all mean?

Still, for the man's cry of agony resounded within her, she desired to discern judgement and punishment, and whomever drowned him that puddle, she would hold him accountable for their actions and mainly their misfire.

"That's not what I meant! You almost did that to ME!" She interrupted, wanting him to realize his folly and she looked back to the fountain, and found it only to be a sight of residual horror.

"I recognize you were in the way, and caught in the crossfire, but it was merely a case of bad timing." He began.

Caira was enraged, his excuse-filled response infuriated her. He offered no responsibility or good graces! Fury ignited within her and she wore an insulted expression of a prideful cat, her posture stood tall after recoiling from her own initial reaction. Ferocity grew quaking in he undertones of her voice, "You are gravely mistaken. It was a misdirection of command that-"

List cut her off, "You do not know who you are speaking to girl, I warn you, do not say anything you may regret."

Caira was silent for a second, she didn't even know who she was, minus her name, but maybe that was the beauty of it all. "I'm afraid, you do not know who you are speaking to." Her eyes turned a menacing glow of violet, onlookers were distracted by the light in her eyes, because they beamed with a flash of color, contrasting from the unpigmented room. The soldiers turned, bracing for attack but that was far from Caira's thought.

With authority, List sneered, "Enlighten me." Challenge surmounted in his voice, one Caira would not surrender to. She was about to give her name, but quickly thought of the consequence, without the particulars of whom she was, it could endanger her later.

"Sure," she offered, settling on it, and smirked with a vicious delight, her mind immediately constructing an identity that would be sure to obstruct any sane emotion he had, and undermine his challenge. After all, it was his responsibility.

"I am Ayryn, a bounty hunter, and after going through all the trouble of tracking and chasing him to this confined location- which proves to be the ideal bait, as it offers an illusion of the safest and most opportune for my prey. I tricked him here, the opportunity to escape from my grasp was incentive enough, whilst I prepared a worse fate... Well that was before you stole my reward and almost banished me to the Underverse!" She had used prior information she overheard on her arrival, about the eight gates, despite that she did not know what they meant. Her lie swayed them, under authority that she didn't register, authority she was speaking to a group of Secondaries, and she, a Prime.

Some of the soldiers were aghast and shifted their weight within their suits of armor. Caira hoped that the story she had comprised, despite being somewhat convoluted, was interwoven with enough facts to trick his truth. This was a climacteric story, one built with some information to establish a false sense of familiarity. The opportunity he had wagered out of arrogance was just enough of a chance for her to demonstrate the significance of mere words. She recounted the story, and now demanded, "I believe apologies would have been in order, but now, seeming how you have defaced my reputation and continue to belittle me, and my skill, you owe a debt.." Her eyes skimmed upon his uniform, "Soldier of the Camelot Army."

There was a reaching, the impact of her words became one that she could hear and savor, in the expression of eyes. Through the mask, as he tried to wrap his head around, and recount what had happened enough to piece in the fragments. Perhaps they would prove to be just sensible enough that her grain of truth could string through.

Had he asked the convicts name, the masquerade would be up. List began, "So you mean to tell me, that you have been here before? When you came down from there, you seemed very disoriented, as though it had been your first." He said in a reproachful voice.

"Ah, I was merely surprised at how your own authority undermined my action, and it remains quite evident, the struggle with this one was quite taxing.. And perhaps, just perhaps, your powers of perception aren't on the level you deem them." She felt her lips move with a quick riposte, she could barely translate them in her thoughts, despite the fire of anger had simmered, her words still tore through and burnt what was touched by them. She did not validate that, in her own story, List had beat her to the punch and captured him first.

In vice, Caira thought his powers of perception were rather accurate, he probably had experience in the Nexus, to base this observation from. She wouldn't let her expression waver, and feeling fierce with rebirth she tilted her head and visualized what a bounty hunter might do. Something that would solidify any doubt and convince them of her identity before she could be tested further. She demanded payment. Though she felt some guilt for putting herself in this situation, she did not blame herself for taking the challenge given to her, after all, the upheaval he had almost caused was apparently a banishment worse than death. In her judgement, someone was to be held accountable, and somehow she would be compensated. Perhaps some falsely targeted anger, even for being put in this place...the Nexus, the Omniverse, this world.

Her expression, she allowed, reverted to the man's perishing authority. "Pay up."

Now. The events that would follow could very well land her in prison (if they had that here), as she had, by her own story, endangered all the transient and unsuspecting people in the Nexus, or by demanding payment for her own life being endangered, would be challenged at the rule a bounty hunter might know too well, in that world it was mainly finders keepers, which very well might end in her death. However, lucky for greenhorn Caira, nothing along those lines seemed to happen because bounty hunters and soldiers each lived by discrepant creeds.

In fact, List whom had previously snarled at her, suddenly laughed in her face. His men appeared perplexed but anticipated what would come next, something Caira could not forsee. She liked them as soldiers and they appeared competent enough, it was quite evident they might just be the best in this place.

"Alright then, earn it." He handed her a sword, which she reached to take from him, but it slipped away from her fingertips and clattered to the ground. "Ah the mighty huntress is unable to hold a sword!" A voice reproved her. With narrowed eyes she regarded the mocking as somewhat childish, and picked up the sword from the ground. The cold metal hilt chilled her fingertips and felt unnaturally heavy, but as she quickly learned, it would become an extension of her arm, power, skill and reputation.

"Three touches, chest. Match. Five to appendages. Match." List said and it was then Caira realized he was setting rules! This sounded particularly like fencing. She was glad to recall something, she knew of fencing.. Or so she thought she did.

As gravity's weight oppressed her joints, she stretched from the compounds of her own repose. With willpower and Omni's promise, she would survive the duel, even to the death.

[Caira Ayryn]

Cascading Resonance 3/3

It seemed she would now imitate a warrior!

Caira marveled at the man's armor, the similar adornment united the troops and made her recall she did not have her own aegis. This might prove to be a painful match, if she survived. The figure that had spoken to her, Omni, had said simply enough that she would not die, but she had been insubordinate to an authority figure here, perhaps picked by Omni himself, and this idea itself may just theorize her own destruction. This, she discerned, was a fight for her life. An air of bewilderment crested her thoughts, at her own willingness to fight to the death.

Fencing, she knew of the game. The game of warriors that was played with swords using the tool of wit. As she was too obdurate and unwilling to take back her words that she felt were, for the most part justified, even if she were perhaps, in the wrong. A hesitant breath exhaled from her lungs, this sporting joust which she would contend, was one which honor was at stake. She was willing to defend her own, as it somehow had played out that way.

The battle commenced, with a commensurate raising of ones' sword and her word, "Prêt." Immediately, her foe aggressively lunged for her Octave, which was guarded by her stance and loitering sword. When the clash of metal chimed together, Caira's eyes filled with an image- no, a memory. It clouded her eyes as her sightless muscles parried her opponent's lunge.

Despite this move being in her favor, her feet moved backwards in retreat, she looked around and she had evidently remained in the pearly room and, to her dismay, still in battle. Her eyes met his in disbelief, Is this a trick? she couldn't understand what was happening to her, these flashes of memory surrounded her. There wasn't time to play the series of events back out in her head to comprise an answer, because the foe charged for her with a riposte. CLANK she heard her own sword disengage his, but before her eyes a scene that did not resemble where her consciousness knew she was. In battle.

The experience was rather disjointing, as the retrospection unraveled, so did the ebb and flow of the duel. For some reason at the rumpus of the swords connecting, the flashes of her past were sparked, whilst the battle still remained fluent. It escaped her how she was to win in this inauspicious circumstance. But continued with her best as she planted her toes in and lunged scoring a touch in his Sword Arm where images cut in, and enwrapped her.

Caira was unable to hold her victory as his riposte skimmed over her skin with weak force to her Quarte, her body dodged but not acutely enough, and her mind was launched elsewhere once more.

This battle had become one against herself, it was so good of a tactic, she had to believe it was intentionally from List. "Did you see that?" She asked him, at this point she was hoping the interruption of images were a trick, the memories that returned to her stung with remnants of battles lost and won, fragmented with adventures and orphans, and weighed remorsefully on her heart with survival and death. All fragments of her own history returned, despite knowing where she stood, nor feeling any pain from the small cut dividing her clavicle. After landing this blow he mentioned, "It's foul game to speak in a duel Ayryn, I don't care if you are a bounty hunter or a soldier." The man had no clue of the anamnesis she had referred to, and it was evident he did not see her memories, but merely caused them (with his initiated movement) to spawn before her eyes.

Keep count! She instructed herself, divided into two worlds, and felt another hit, this time the blade grazed her Septime.

Two out of Three, torso. At this rate she was soon destined to loose, and it wasn't hard to see, with Caira's eyes distant and her stance's foundation being the only thing to respond in battle, built on response and instinct alone. It wouldn't last much longer if she was unable to sense the next move coming, with her own memories creating a wave that undermined her thoughts and overwhelmed her keen senses.

Improvise! she mandated, and within the second, created a blindfold after ripping off a sleeve. The opponent she could no longer see, growled, "You are down two Core touches, are you mocking me?" This time, her actions had not been to disrespect him, or retaliate against him, but were necessary to keep up any game she had left.

She could now anticipate his next move. His tactical strategy was based on aggression -however admirable- now, she could easily predict where his next strike would touch.

Caira's perception of the match had rigorously changed. Suddenly, the fluctuation of List's advances seemed to become poky and slow, while she became swift and concise and began to anticipate the attack with pristine clarity. She could hear his feet shift, due to his noisy armor. Her blow fell again on the same sword arm, this time cutting through armor, delivering a flesh wound and presumably partially inhibiting his swordsmanship ability.

This limitation would impede the motion and agility of his revolving sword, and though images of her past came, they were not as powerful to block her cognition of his next incoming attack. She lunged and planted a parrying touch on his Octave. He riposted, but did not land a touch. She then hit is Septime as she disengaged his movement. Suddenly images flashed and she recounted how she had come upon this place. A cognizance was struck. I'm really here.

List lunged too fast for himself and his balance faltered and was lost, while Caira dodged and gasped as a memory of her planet becoming overrun with meteorites filled her with anguish and despair. They can't all be dead.. she thought while her free fist clenched at her side with its knuckles fading into white.

Her foe regained his balance while she was distracted. There was a pause in the silence and absence of movement. They were tied. Even. Equals. However Caira's advantage grew as a rekindled flame ignited within her, the reminiscence sparked a fire that thirsted for vendetta, one that was unable to be quenched with any assuage; this smoldering desire for vengeance elicited within her was something a monk would never desire, but a bounty hunter might.

Their swords met, both leaned in with their power and strength as they attempted to subjugate their opponent for the last time. On her muscles, a pressure shifted, it retracted and Caira astutely gaged the reaction of her enemy by the tense and subtle flow of his sword. Behind her blindfold, her closed eyes recalled the garbled black mass she had been stranded in before she met the cascade of the fountain and the light from the dazzling white room. It was the same darkness that had kept her from saving the ones she cared for.

Caira relinquished as List's arm grew tired. Her stance swiftly drew back as she landed a subversive move that ended the match. He lost his footing, her sword swept across his Sixte shoulder and landed a fraction from his neck. A move that would have landed on his jugular had she not at the last second, relinquished the force held on the sword.

He had been defeated. But Caira had now won a meaningless victory. He seemed surprised when she removed the sword from his shoulder, and that the battle didn't end in his death. But with the defeat of his honor. To her, nothing could compare to the helplessness that encumbered her, and deluged her in emotion. The blindfold she had fastened, had loosened during each movement and now lightly drifted onto the ground. Her vision was speckled, she saw in patches of light; curriculum vitae freshly recounted in her thoughts yet entified behind purblind darkness, would become nothing more than a vestige of her fading past.

A fear now revealed itself, and she descried that she did not belong here, yet it may prove she was destined to become a constituent all the more. Her honor paled in comparison to her hopeless fear of meaningless death.
...

As Leader List treated his wound, he went over to his opponent out of goodwill. "Well Bounty Hunter, you bested me, and earned your guerdon, but first let's fix up your wounds." His spirit had transformed, so had his demeanor; he was perhaps better in failure and renewed with a greater sense of perspective. A polar opposite of Caira, whom now became denatured into the worst she could be, interred with engrossing dismay. (Though honor and life were two very different things.)

Her posture aligned, her eyes had slipped into a pale silver from repressing the painful the surges of memories, and her own sense of sight. His eyes fell on her wounds, her silver blood had commenced healing itself. But he still offered his assistance.

"You don't owe me anything." She said with a toneless sigh as her eyes locked on the ground while her expression sunk with despair, which List couldn't understand because she claimed the victory. Still, she could learn yet, how to rebound from failure, even if it were the one she revered as the most horrific.

Meanwhile, Caira's thoughts tasted a reproachful pain, regret. I'm unable to recompense with the past, with too many questions remaining unanswered and the exigency of the answers could not be of a higher priority. Why were asteroids sent to destroy all that she knew? Who, provoked thus attack on her home? How did she end up on the front lines of the first brigade? And what about her parents? How did she get to this exact moment in time and space? These were questions only Omni might have the answer to. The concatenation between these events- an attenuated thread- would sooner or later be found out. She would then discover the consequence of searching for it.

With the means of her own capabilities, pertinacity, incentive, and the willingness of her own enmity to perhaps do one of the most dangerous things imaginable. She was ready to sacrifice everything and braced herself to convert her soul in order for her answers to be pursued. Driven by the animosity of a vendetta to avenge all she had lost, and being the last alive to achieve the feat, she quested one day to crown it all.

Her vengeance may one day allow her brethren to rest in peace. She would hunt them, and only them, for the purpose of personal bounty on their head. Whoever had done this to her 'kin' would pay. And maybe, just maybe, they were in this very Verse.

"Hm? Well, you won the match, and I am a man of my word, though I don't have much to offer you on a soldier's salary." List offered, somehow still jovial in his failure, and respecting his victor. She turned to him then, "You paid off your debt to me whether you know it or not." He then requested for her to not soil his pride in front of his men.

"I'll tell you how you can pay me back. Offer me a tour of Camelot, List."

...
A few things occurred before they were on their way through the Nexus. Caira overheard a Secondary that was new to List's party, and someone else talking about how to conjure Omnilium step by step, and that it was disappointing that Secondaries had not met Omni personally.

Moments later List requested she create her own steed and asked why she had not repaired her attire. Caira cringed. His questions confounded her because she had no manual to begin with.

After a few minutes of thinking about a new sleeve for her right arm, and picturing a replacement sleeve, a gauntlet of white steel appeared, forming out of an elusive energy bubble. The gauntlet of pristine quality connected to the binds of her attire that was left. She blinked. This didn't match. White gauntlet of armor against a relatively black attire. She frowned. But there wasn't enough time to fix that now, the party had begun mounting.

Next she looked at the fountain and felt a strong correspondence to the flowing of water. Focusing for a few moments, in her hands formed a small circular beaker, she dipped it in, and later corked it. But she would not take and leave nothing behind. In her pocket she dug out the last remnant she had of home, a beautiful picture, half torn and with many creases in the papyrus from use and adoration. She dropped it in the Fountain of Infinity, though she did not know of its name at the time, and stared at the bead of water in the glass, she held it elevated in her hands before securing it.

Lastly, before she was ready to leave, she decided to summon a book. She rather enjoyed infinity at her fingertips, and savored the possibility that something more might come from her abdication here than despair.

It took a few minutes but, it appeared before her and because she had not wanted the others to peer over her shoulder, she encrypted it. Only someone related to her could pick it up and read it, on the cover, past the title, it described "If you can read this, I'm in the Omniverse too." And the contents within, were what she would read as she traveled to the gate. All the things she didn't get briefed on with her strange arrival.

List inclined at her strangely, "You're going to read and walk to the gate? What about a horse for yourself?"

Caira simply explained that there were more important things (like knowledge before arriving at the gate), while trotting onward for some time. And her eyes widened as they trailed the last words on the page. She could summon parts of her world back, if it wasn't destroyed. Instilled with a renewed sense of hope she paused mid step, and idled behind the swift legion of soldiers. She gritted her teeth at the realization, if they weren't alive, would she bring them back from the dead? Their slumber? Necromancy of the Undead was not something she had any information on.

It was almost too much for her as she sauntered nearing the gate, she had finished with the book, and placed it beside the portal. She had no use for it, and the content had been read. She felt she had established a minimal basis on the Verse before her. Camelot awaited.




(from Nexus to Camelot)