Nine Lives

[Gildarts]

Meanwhile.

Billie Collins was reporting back from his post in Dalaran when he had intercepted an owl that told him to check back in on the current situation of the tournament. He had obliged to the obligating orders and gradually turned with the white wings of the creature he rode upon as he changed directions. Little did Billie Collins know that following these orders would change his life, forever.

The day before, he had asked his wife to marry him. The smile could not be torn from his lips as his fiance graciously accepted his offer and they set the date that they should be wed. Lilies were always her favorite, Collins smiled as he thought of his would-be bride surrounded by the beautiful fragrance and showered by the glowing white petals. He had stashed one in his cloak pocket, and awaited her delighted smile as he would bring it home to her.

He was the happiest man in the world. And his life was now complete. He was a soldier of Camelot, the most noble, strong, and resolved faction. Billie Collins would give his life for King Aragorn, for the King’s justice, and for the sense of purpose and hope Aragorn gave him, a humble secondary, in this world composed for Primes.

Gliding on air, Collins approached the Colosseum, only to see that events seemed under control. He had dismounted, prowled around a bit in an investigative demeanor before determining it was time to ride back home.

In the solitude that was his return trip - one he had done at least a thousand times - never, would he have guessed just what would soon wipe the enchanted smile from his overjoyed lips

He had swooped lower to the ground so he could freely adjust some of the pieces of his armor, and prematurely take them off, as he always did on his rounds home. It was then when in the reflection of the silver, polished mirror did he see a familiar silhouette disappear. In the town he had called home for so long, a building had simply vanished! He was much too high to pinpoint the source, so he swooped a little lower, only to be the only living man to see the evil Prime lay waste to his beloved town.

Brown eyes widened and the wind flattening his hair streamed to a stop as the Pegasus hovered above the ground. It whinnied and attempted to buck him from his perch, yet they remained before the shockwave of destruction hit them, sending them flying before they turned themselves around with his nifty guidance on the reigns and quickly set themselves upright, luckily, just before they slammed into ground.

Out of the corner of his eye, Billie Collins had seen it. The tremendous strength, the deathly horror, and then the tormenting silence that blanketed everyone’s grave. 

Collins again mounted his beast, flying just above the town now as he directed the winged creature to where his home should have been. His eyes darted, It would all be okay, if she were still alive, somehow, somehow, she HAD to be alive. If she wasn’t... No, he couldn’t think of that. Collins sifted past the neighborhoods, overlooking a few pleas of help from a half-crushed man. His vision was a tunnel, and he looked only for his home.


In its place, a pile of crimson bricks. Worry wedged into his eyes, as for a single moment, the only part of the town that was not covered in the cubed stone was the direct center. The source of the macabre scene he had witnessed, the source of the pain, the loss of anything and everything he had ever loved had just been utterly decimated. His home. His life. His memories of the town he had grown up in.

The destroyer looked exactly like the grim reaper, and instead of a scythe, this man had a silver arm. Fire struck in Billie’s eyes and he memorized the man’s great stature, and the edges of the cloak the man wore.

“Fight him.” The wind whispered to Billie Collins. Tempting his uprising anger, yet fear conquered where courage should have remained. And instead, the pegasus changed direction, and fled from the strong Prime. Instead, Billie landed where his own front doorstep should have been. He as off-duty. And she had to be here. She had to be alive.

“Allie.” His bloodied hands continued to be slashed by the scattering of sharp debris as he fervently dug through sharp handfuls of brick and stone. Finally he found her corpse. It was sundown by then, and he held his would-be wife one last time in his hands. Cold and limp, she had left him all alone. “I should’ve been here for you Allie. I could have... I could have...” In her apron pocket, he found a protruding corner. An envelope, no, a card, titled to him. “Billie” was written in cursive with a little heart scrawled in the place of where the dot of his ‘i’ should have been.

First he rested the lillie in her hand, then he moaned in agony as he opened it. What was meant for him, and what could have been inside. In the darkness, his hands only felt the soft touch of cotton. “What is...” His eyes fell upon the bootie. It was the sock meant for a baby. Despair shook the world around him. Endless tears poured from his eyes as suddenly his wavering gaze steadied. He knew what he had to do.

After taking one lasting glance at what was left of his home he mounted his pegasus and departed. He left from the tomb. In the destruction where there had been no screaming, there had been no pain. There was only death.

Billie clutched the bootie in his right hand, soft, cold, and empty. Never again. He vowed, Never again.