Uncharted

[Caira Ayryn]

The girl still felt shivers of darkness despite her finding a way out through the ruins’ strange tunnel system, and departing into the heat of the desert. She didn’t notice much of anything valuable left, nor could she decipher who it was who had lived in the stone houses (or cages) prior to their degeneration. The existence of the ruins did not mean much to her during her search for the lizard Karn, who had hidden himself behind a large rock after her fall, his lizard tail between his legs.

“Ah! There’s my hero,” she growled and picked him up by the tail, “To think I was gonna help you hitch a ride with me. But you were working for that creep weren’t you? He was the mage that turned you to his henchmen, right?” her eyes narrowed as she held him dangling as it attempted to nip her. “Don’t try that with me Karn, I know you can talk.”

It nipped again at her finger, so she flung him off to the side, “Hope you aren’t poisonous, that’s the only reason I let you off with just a toss.” Caira looked at her compass, sure it was accurate, and the desert lizard looked the same, but how could she be certain? To her, any amphibian looked the same: Covered in scales.

She gulped, I don’t think I actually imagined him talking...

“Alright Karn, being the hospitable knight that I am, I'm willing to give you a second chance. And I’ll even get you to the mages of Dalaran safely so they can transfigure you back.” she said and looked around as the lizard slithered back into sight.

“Jeez.” Caira thought for a moment. What if Karn was the cloaked figure, I’m not sure I can take the chance of bringing him back to town knowing what he is capable of, but the lizard wasn’t lying.. Unless I can’t tell because lizards are cold blooded... Still, they have a heart. The Prime reviewed her options carefully. This could mean her death and more havoc.

The girl finally recalled the chip of crystal she had borrowed and strapped it onto the lizard’s head. “Listen, I can’t let you kill me, and I can’t read your mind, but this will let you talk to me, I think.” she said rather doubtfully.

“Testing, testing, this thing on?” Karn’s voice said humorously and his thoughts pounded horribly into her mind. “So why did you slam me against that rock again?” he snarked angrily.

“What? You were the one who nipped at my finger!” Caira defended.

“I’m a small lizard. You ought not be afraid of that.” he said as though he were no threat.

“Tch. Down in the tunnels, I met a creepy guy, and he was probably either the wizard that did this to you, or you are him because he has since disappeared. And in that form, you were able to talk not because he let you, but because of the same crystal I just strapped to your head.” Karn did look rather strange with the cloudy blue rock strapped to his head. She warned him once, “Karn, if you are that wizard, and are lying to me. I will not hesitate to kill you. And I keep my promises.”

Karn blinked, he wasn’t going to challenge her in his lizard form, if he was lucky, he would get her to bring her to town before slithering away.

“I will bring you, however I may have to tie you up." Caira muttered.

The lizard squirmed and said, “This wasn’t part of the agreement! If I were the wizard why would I want you to bring me back to town?”

Caira sighed, “Perhaps you are the Ghost of the Ruins, there are rumors of you. Curses alike can happen when wizards cast the wrong spells. So you cast one on the coffin that way, and then came here, tried to uproot a prized crystal only to be changed into a lizard above ground or when you attempt to escape.”

“That probably makes sense, to you.” Karn did the closest thing to a sigh a lizard could do.

“That, or you are his henchmen. Greed befalls anyone who values any thing higher than themselves. The reason I’m stranded here is because I put myself in a position where I could die and decided that I valued the risk of treasure and my goal more than my own safety. But I suppose that is why I’m a bounty hunter and avid adventurer, as well as a knight. Anyway, let's head out Karn, if I find you are one who kills in the shadows, I’ll kill you in the light.”

The seething threat withstood and Caira had started off on her hover board in the same direction as the camels hoof-prints had and the lizard’s head poked out of the sachet she carried him in. Time rolled with the endless dunes.

Hours shaved away, and they weren’t near any well-marked landscape. It was at this moment she knew they were going the wrong direction. Toward the edge of the desert. “Karn, I have a question, has a Prime ever reached the edge of a verse before?”

"What makes you ask that?" the lizard grumbled, resting and half asleep on top of her trunk.

"Because, I suspect that we may be going in the wrong direct-" Caira's eyes fell on the hoof prints below -well, the lack of- they had now stopped.

“Huh? What? I thought we were going into town, use that handy compass of yours and get us going!”

“Karn. Answer, please.” Caira was curt.

“Er.. No, I don’t believe anyone has made it that far and lived, though I am a secondary, to my knowledge, I grew up in Coruscant and for the most part something would always stop Primes from reaching the edge. That's what they say about the Omniverse.”

[Caira Ayryn]

A thick fog, yes, fog in the desert, hung lazily the moment she trespassed beyond a certain layer of now silver sand. Crackling was the thunder and lightning in the distance, while the sound and blaze of streaking light steadily drifted closer.

Humidity clung on the inside of her lungs with every breath. "Karn, what's the map say about this?"

The duo had opened the trunk, and it offered only a short, vague riddle, which they had read seemingly a thousand times. The words were the only instruction or map inside their treasured box. It read a follows:

Once you have passed the darkest war,
Seek the tower amidst the score,
Within the light and darkness more,
A force of nature will lead you to the door.

"Four lines of utter bullshit if you ask me," Karn spoke, skeptically.

"Maybe we're in what it describes as the darkest war now?" Caira thought out loud, though Karn said nothing constructive.

"Yeah, or maybe this is how Omni penalizes those who get too curious about where his verse boundaries are."

"Yeah yeah, I think we're close." Caira was convinced.

"Yeah, close to our deaths. Oh, I'm sorry, I forget you're immortal sometimes. C'mon, are we really going to go to the actual edge, or will you deliver me safe and sound to where you promised to take me."

"Still, that promise remains, as long as your promise is true. For all I know, you're some deadly wizard or something. I have no way of knowing when you will strike. You could obliterate all of my progress any moment now, or you could help decipher the code. I for one, think that the mention of a tower in the desert is ridiculous, however maybe there's some crazy law of construction that I don't know about. Gravity does work differently here. Still, I can't help but to wonder."

[Caira Ayryn]

With that, a bolt of galvanizing lightning shot straight into her. The smoldering heat bound her shoes to the ground, while her knees, and everything above, shook with a great amount of zing. Karn had remained on the hover-board, safely off of the ground, had he not been floating, he would have been shocked like the girl, and instantly killed.

Meanwhile, Caira's insides turned to jelly, stirred only by the flames of electricity that took but seconds to cut through her skin. Her teeth clenched, and bright blue static shot from lip to lip. Her hands were out of her control, and while she tried desperately to clench them, to hold onto something, to stop the shaking and somehow redirect the pain, she was unable to, and her pale skin quickly heated into a lustrous shade of pink.

After a moment of shivering agony, nature's hot grip released her, and the lightning escaped through the other foot clamped on the groundless dunes. Caira stumbled over and collapsed on the ground, her motor functions, too numb to catch her fall. She ate sand but her lips didn't move away from the sensation. Due to her saliva, grains stuck to her teeth and found themselves in curious nooks in her mouth. Still, the girl remained motionless.

It was unclear to Karn whether or not she couldn't, or wouldn't move. The lizard blinked and directed the board over to her, he was not eager to jump from his position of safety, even if Caira was his ticket out of the desert. The lizard's voice rasped, "Hey, girl, you better not be dead."

[Caira Ayryn]

Her mouth was dry, and full of gravel. She had no idea how the sand managed to stay stuck on her tongue, when all of her saliva had evaporated with the unearthly heat of lightning that had struck her. She flexed a finger, then a toe. Caira finally found it within her to lift her eyelids open.

"Ughh." She expressed, with the weakness of a defeated warrior.

"Come on kid, you had me scared for a minute there! Now, stand up, and let's high-tail it outta here." Karn prompted

Enthusiasm lined her voice, and Caira immediately found the strength to recoil at surrender, and raise to the challenge. "What? You think I'll leave after that? This place obviously doesn't want people to trespass. That means... We're here."

Karn only smiled.

...

The pair wandered through the fog, ignited by new energy. Her eyes flicked to his as they caught the shadowy silhouette of a tower and drew closer to its stairs.

"Wait, girl, this is..." Karn's features trembled in trepidation, "This is the temple of the God of the Desert."

"God of the desert?" Caira echoed.

"What awaits in there is sure to mean certain death to me in my weakest form." the lizard continued.

Caira was aghast, "You're going to chicken out now? NOW? We're right here, don't you want to meet Omni, I bet you he could free you from the curse-"

"Or I could die." Karn's tone was absolute, "And while you could surely resummon me, you would, no doubt, somehow find a way to make my curse final."

"Can't I fix it with Omnillium?" Caira asked, even if it was her enemy, leaving him here if she never returned, would mean certain death.

"No."

Caira felt a wave of compassion overwhelm her. Why couldn't she? Was it Karn's stubbornness? Or was he thoroughly convinced this was the way it had to be. In the lizard's eyes, there was a look that touched the gentle lines of shame. She could tell anything that made him lose his honor, meant more to him than dying. As a knight, Caira had to respect his choice, because every avenue they had determined, only ensured his death, his spell to be permanent, or an inaccurately summoned being who was not him. Her hands were tied.

"Alright," she began reluctantly, "But I won't leave you here without resource."

Caira gave the creature a cell phone, and then took the time to summon some food for him. There was gratitude in his eyes, but none expressed verbally. "Here you go," she spoke finalizing their deal.

The lizard spoke to her as she neared the first stair, "I wish you luck, Ayryn."

"And I, you, Karn."

[Caira Ayryn]

The sands of time blew rapidly and scraped like a jagged, aimless saw against her skin. Brazen and rough, she fought the wind with her very first step. Stone staircase, it seemed as aimless as the wind, or rather as pointless, but the only direction she would grasp for, was up.

Fleeting were the pooling lumps of sand that tugged down on her feet in combined mounds. Swirling in the air, only to land on every surface imaginable. Disabling, deafening, disastrous, like a blizzard of confusion. Moments and memories snagged on her thoughts, which only concentrated on ascending the stairs.

The fleeting face of her master, the head monk, the man of the council, and the stars above, strewn across the sky, as she once was. Cast down from the heavens, as she once was. This was her second chance. It was her chance to meet Omni. Doubt swirled within her, more vehemently than the wind that threatened to take her crashing down her course.

It was disturbing. The presence that the tower brought. Its indistinct shadow seemed to rumble with untold time. Far away, long in the distance, blended together with the visions of the future and glimpses of the dreaded past, was that which awaited.

She gulped in a mouthful of sand and swallowed the grainy bits while drinking in more. There was not time to summon any damn water, nor could she even find it within herself to rip a piece of cloth from her shirt to wrap it over her nose. Gravel filled the cavities of her ears, and found its way in between her eyelashes. Caira, a person who valued judgement and justice before all else, now was being taught a little patience.

Merik still was free, and she knew it. She knew him to be wandering the desert somewhere. And now, what? She was seeing images of his dead face? Pale as chalk, eyes as dark and lifeless as an trickle-less pond.

Then there was an image, one of red, one of green, and one of a scull, distinctly spiraling through the air in a train of fire. Another blink and the images of these men were gone. Caira felt fear thrill her throat, and set her heartbeat racing. Gunshots all round, fire, death, and ... No. Not him. That red-eyed bastard. Still, freeing him was the right choice. Even if it may not ensure Omni's favor, there was no taking it back now. There were no mistakes now. The past, while it existed very really, had no influence on the future. On her future.

Only life and death had a hold of her now.

She still had things to do, and if she was trapped here, then she would fight Omni himself for escape.

Before her eyes now, was the image, very distant, of her entire planet, moments from explosion. "DID YOU TAKE ME THEN JUST TO TORTURE ME?" She screamed to the thin air, and her voice was quickly snuffed out by the hollow wind.

"WHO ARE YOU TO DO THIS TO ME?" Who are you to save me? Caira, had she seen any walls, any movement or motion, would have punched it. [/b]In HALF.[/b]

What did it all mean? The Omniverse. Immortality. Was she just some character in a book? Was it so futile, was her [/i]life[/i] and destiny so futile, that it could be rewritten with the magic of a single naked being? He didn't even have eyes, of course, it didn't seem like he needed them. Not to really see. But damn it all, seemed like he was blind and delusional if he thought he had some exponential power over everyone else in this world. Even if it was, his world.

A figure stood at the top. Finally, her cramping legs had reached the end. She could have used a hot bath, a glass of water, and well, a good drink.

The figure, once her eyes fell on him, she felt the winds unraveling her curled hair, to suddenly stop their incessant spin. Jhen Mohran had dark eyes, and wore a dark suit. His face was out in the open, however, upon any reflection back on that moment, she would not have remembered a single characteristic of what he looked like. As though the memory was shrouded in shadow, so was the force of nature. The memory drifted away as the sand that had accumulated in piles now swiftly tumbled in a stream down the lengthy staircase.

"You have come long and far, traveler." A voice or a feeling, something, carried by the wind seemed to say. It also seemed to welcome her.

Caira blinked and gulped. She had no reason to believe that this wasn't the gate to Omni's front door. Still, she'd need a little convincing, not one to believe a first-told lie. It was almost too easy. A set of stairs and what, I'm there? It was almost unimaginable. But no,her gut warned her, always a good indicator of the danger to come, the test would soon come.