Genesis of Apotheosis

[Strazio Rockwell]

Strazio stepped outside and looked up towards the sky. The sun had crawled past its apex and began a lazy tumble towards the horizon. He frowned. They had spent more time here then he had expected. Not that he necessarily had anywhere to be or anything urgent to do, he just hated being idle. The mage sniffed the air and was greeted by the faint scent of fresh water and an earthy aroma that he couldn’t quite distinguish. The hair on his skin stood on end and a fuzzy bolt of lightning loped across his body. His father used to say that coastal people had a sixth sense. That because they lived so close to the dangers of the ocean that they had an innate, almost unearthly, prescience of danger that had yet to come. Strazio shivered. Perhaps it was just a breeze. Perhaps not. Regardless the white-haired boy was not one to look towards the nebulous future and turned back inside.

“Hey Malon,” he half-shouted across the room, “and you two hornheads we should get going before it gets dark, I’d rather not spend another night here.”

“Okay,” Malon responded, “I’ll be right there.”

Gamzee and Karkat bumbled past Strazio, their footfalls were identical. Strazio sighed. He couldn’t quite put his finger on why their strange behavior poked at his over sensitive nerves, and were it not for Tearen’s lesson he probably would have never even considered that he should be anything but annoyed with them, but he found himself becoming increasingly weary of their antics. Malon followed behind them shortly after she collected her belongings. The four companions stood at the center of Tearen’s campsite and took a moment to collect themselves and agree on a travel plan. Once their path was decided they spent a few moments in silence. As much as it pained him to admit it, Strazio would miss Wover. Despite the fact that they weren’t especially close and hadn’t known each other for more than a week Strazio’s trust for the man had only been galvanized by the recent events.

“Alright,” Strazio said after a spell, “let’s get going.”

And with that the quartet trudged off into the forest.

As they walked Malon and Strazio hovered towards the front of the pack, while the two trolls lagged behind. Every now and again the rage mage would glance back and bark at them to keep up, but for the most part their trek through the Tangled Green was one of quiet contemplation. After a few hours of walking they stopped to rest. Strazio planted his ass on a fallen tree and drank from his waterskin. Malon stole a glance at him and he raised his eyebrows.

“Something on my face?” he asked.

She shook her head no and looked away.

“If you’ve got something to say, just say it,” Strazio stated flatly, “it’ll just annoy me if you’re trying to hide something.”

“It’s just,” she said, paused, and then continued, “I’ve seen your life before you came here, or at least scraps of it.”

Strazio furrowed his brow and responded, “and?”

“And, well, it’s just, you’ve been through a lot,” Malon said.

Strazio nodded and glanced over at the two trolls. Gamz and Karkat were off in their own world, oblivious to the current conversation. He closed his eyes and remembered the snippets of memories that were not his own. Memories of Lon Lon ranch danced in his head as if they were his own. Memories of the horrible times spent on Alternia plagued his brain.

“We’ve all been through a lot,” Strazio said, standing up as he spoke, “it doesn’t really matter though, what’s happened has happened and can’t be changed.”

There was a moment of silence before Malon spoke again, “you told me that Ganondorf was here in the Omniverse, where is he?”

“Dunno,” the mage replied, “we fought a few times in Dante’s Abyss and then met up in The Town with No Name, never really cared for the pompous prick so we didn’t really stay in contact.”

“Why did you meet up after the Abyss?” she asked.

Strazio shrugged, “well, I’ve been trying to raise a group to kill Dracula, and, at the time, I had no real allies to speak of, I knew Ganon was strong and so I sought him out to form an alliance, didn’t really work out in the long run, but eh, at least I’ve got Gamz now.”