Welcome to Gaia! ::

Recaps and Updates

Toki's delight at Tian Yue's return had forestalled the Aoide's panic at the state of his Lord - but once they were down in the Dragon King's chambers proper, and once Toki and Xing Yun had chased the mortals out of the bedroom, Toki's 'mothering' came out in full force. "Oh, so much blood," he fussed, wringing his hands. "That must have been so terrible for you!"

"It wasn't the most fun thing I've ever experienced, no," Tian Yue replied, wincing. "But I don't think I'll need to do it again."

Toki blinked, and then - as realization spread over his face - he actually squealed. "Oh, my Lord!"

Xing Yun, on the other hand, bowed deeply. "A true blessing in dark times, Lord. You truly have ascended fully?"

"Yes," Tian Yue said, with a decisive nod. "I met with Shaiming," he added quietly, glancing at Toki; the Aoide grew silent at once, his eyes round. "We have become one in truth."

"You resemble him greatly," Toki said, with a soft smile; a tear traced down his cheek. "Truly, Tien Lung walks before me again. That I should live to see this day..."

"But I can tell many did not," Tian Yue said, drooping a bit. "I did not intend to be gone so long, far from it. What has happened in my absence?"

"I will draw a bath," Toki began, but Tian Yue waved him off.

"No, no bath. Those resources are too precious. Damp towels will do to clean away the blood."

"Yes, Lord." Toki scurried into the bathroom.

Xing Yun shifted from hoof to hoof, a bit awkwardly. "Lord?"

"Yes?" He glanced over at her, this unfamiliar Aoide - he hadn't gotten to know her very well at all before his departure with Zhijian. "How have you fared, Xing Yun?"

She brightened a bit at the sound of her name. "You remembered."

"Of course I remember. You're mine, I wouldn't forget that." He offered her a reassuring smile. "Please, sit with me and tell me what has happened." If nothing else, her retelling would likely be a bit easier to follow than Toki's.

"Yes, Lord." She bowed and knelt before him. "The Weeks moved in succession as they always had, Lord - Plague and Famine finished their ravages, and Decay followed. Then the Trumpet blew again, and everything trembled mightily... I am told, Lord, that the planes of Hell, all the Hells, Netherworlds, and such that mortals have every dreamed, were collapsed downwards into the planes where mortals dwell. Many things fell, and the denizens of those planes were freed."

Tian Yue flinched; Toki bustled out of the bathroom just then, bearing an armful of towels and a bowl of warm water. "Are you well, Lord?"

"Perfectly - Xing Yun is recounting the events of the past two months." He nodded at the goat-like Aoide. "Please continue, both of you."

"Yes, Lord," they said in unison; Toki handed Xing Yun a towel, and they both dipped their respective towels in water and began to gently wash Tian Yue's wounds. "Yet even when all seemed beyond hope, Lord," Xing Yun continued, as she patted at Tian Yue's right shoulder, "a blessing came to us. Ying Long placed news of the prophecy you witnessed on a message-board kept below - and it seems many took note of it, for the Trumpet did not sound again for a full month. The Chrysalis has been chained in Manacles, Lord."

"Wonderful," Tian Yue breathed, relieved - so Jin Huang had done it, as had Phaedra, presumably. So she is useful after all. "And then what? The Trumpet did sound again, then?"

"Indeed so, Lord - just a week ago. This time, what descended was a sense of peace. People are calling it the Week of Paradise. It seems calm, other than the movements of the demons. And yet I mistrust it. Cracks have appeared in the Manacles." Xing Yun frowned as she moved to minister to Tian Yue's horns; on the opposite side, Toki did the same. "There is peace, but..."

"But it will not last forever." Tian Yue sighed. The fate-stones they'd seen on their first trip to the Ancient Pantheon had told them that much. "You said that the prophecy has been made known?"

"Yes, Lord - and gods and mortals alike are moving to fulfill it. There was a ceremony of red lotuses, and now it seems we are gathering all resources towards the great ritual spoken of in the prophecy."

"Then I have returned just in time. It may be that my power can help dampen the effects of Gehenna..." Tian Yue looked thoughtful. "I will have to experiment. What of the others?"

"No new lives have been lost of our group, Lord," Toki put in. "Penny is well, and has moved with boldness! She has spoken to Ying Long, and to the Lord of Dream."

Tian Yue raised one eyebrow. "Really? She must have made a good recovery, then."

"Indeed, my Lord." Xing Yun dipped her towel in the basin again and began to clean Tian Yue's hair. "Much hope has been raised among the mortals. The will to live is strong."

"Thank you both." Tian Yue thought, hard. So their main enemy, right now, was time - if the Manacles held another month, then... "We need to move swiftly. I will speak with Penny, and see the Manacles for myself... and I must speak with Zhijian, and the rest of my brothers..." Seeking out Universe would be nice, but he had to admit that his motives for that wouldn't be quite so much geared towards saving the world, but rather to clear out the echoes of loneliness and loss that still resonated from the ancient memories. "One more thing. What was the ray gun for?"

Toki squirmed. "Well... demons, Lord. They haven't made any assault on the Pantheon, but..."

"Ah. I see." In better times, he'd have paid money to see Captain Jax Corvus go up against demons with a ray gun - it sounded like the ultimate pulpy B-movie epic. "Well, at least he didn't hit me."

"Do you require anything, Lord?" Xing Yun asked, patting gently at the side of his face to clean the blood there.

"A nap, I think. But not too long of a nap - just enough to recover and catch my bearings." Tian Yue shook his head, then winced a little. Yes, sleep would be good. Actual sleep, in an actual bed.

"I will keep the mortals out, Lord. Until you are ready." Toki picked up the basin and nodded.

"Thank you." Tian Yue let himself sink back into the bed, gratefully, then winced as his shoulder-spikes impaled a pillow. "Bother."

Petals and Chains

Catching up with everyone else took most of the afternoon - Jax gawped at him and promptly apologized, both for doubting his divinity and for shooting at him. The other mortals were timid and shy, but Tian Yue could still feel the flickers of belief inside them. At least they were at ease around the Aoidei now, if nothing else.

After the long string of conversations was finished, Toki re-appeared in triumph with an elegant robe patched together from the ones he'd taken out of the wardrobe. "See, the sleeves are separate - they leave your shoulders bare, so your spikes won't be any trouble at all," he said, happily, demonstrating.

"Truly, you are a marvel of domestic achievement," Tian Yue replied, amused. Toki glowed at the compliment.

Thus properly attired at last, Tian Yue was ready for the next step - leaving his chambers, and descending to check on the Chrysalis, on his Lord. He'd seen the bound Chrysalis on the fate-stone, as well as the bound representation of the Gehenna-beast itself earlier. Hopefully the binding offered succor, not pain.

The Dragon King slipped out of his chambers and down the hall, surprised at the level of noise from below - there were people there, and many of them. When he'd left, the lower floor of the Pantheon had been like a tomb, with people creeping in and out unless called by the god on the Throne - a sacred but dread space. Now the same respect was evident, but the outer areas of the lower floor were a hive of activity.

The mortals and unfamiliar Aoidei parted easily before him, the Aoidei bowing and several of the mortals giving him downright terrified looks. Am I really that imposing? he wondered, bemused - well, with the horns and the wicked shoulder-spikes, he supposed he probably was.

Then he turned his steps towards the Throne Hall, and those things ceased to matter.

"My Lord," Tian Yue whispered, his feet crunching on dried lotus petals; the red offerings were mounded everywhere, evidence of the first ritual that had taken place. The Chrysalis sat dark within its shining chains, but the Dragon King could see the cracks along the surface of the bright metal. It could not hold forever, but the cracks were somehow profoundly disturbing. Their only hope of restraint was failing, and fast.

Tian Yue knelt before the Chrysalis, his tail knocking up a swirl of dried red petals. "My Lord, I have returned to you - Worldshield in full, reborn entire," he whispered, reaching out one hand to touch the warm, sticky surface of the black mass. "We will save you, Lord."

He remained there, silent, for a long moment, then glanced up at the windows. The Gehenna-beast looked balefully down from above. His gaze flicked over to the window depicting Universe. And Lucius...

Universe had been right - memory was unkind, but it had forged him into Tien Lung in truth. When they had leisure, he would have to speak with Lucius once more.

For now, Tian Yue returned his focus to the Chrysalis. "We will save you," he repeated, his tail lashing up another storm of petals. "You have my word."

No answer came from the snared darkness before him, but Tian Yue couldn't help but feel... that his Lord had heard.

Unexpected Requests

The Bleeding of the Stars

((In which Tian Yue both discovers and bitterly mourns Universe's ending.))

Seeking Names I - Deep Deep Down

Determination was all very well and good, but Tian Yue found himself wavering nevertheless - even with the promise he had made to himself, this new grief and the powerful resonance it held with the past was the ultimate distraction. It echoed, and bounced back emotions and visions that had nothing to do with the present day. If he let his mind wander or his control falter, like that he would be Shaiming again, scrabbling at the Gallery and roaring desperately at the stars until his throat bled.

But there aren't any stars. Not any more. He wasn't sure if that one sharp difference made things better or worse. The mortals were shell-shocked too - if the sky disappearing hadn't been bad enough, the personal loss to those in his chambers was great as well. They were starfarers, as in love with the Universe in an objective sense as any mortals could be, even if none of them save Penny had known that Universe had been a god as well. They certainly hadn't known that the whole of space could die. Penny's face had settled into a constant pallor, and Jax kept sneaking glances at the window, looking up at the empty nothingness above and then down again, repeatedly, very fast each time.

Just move past it for a little while. A little while. A bit more, Tian Yue repeated, like a mantra. He could do that. A little longer. Perhaps when their Lord was restored, so, too, could Universe...

He firmly ignored the inner whisperings that what had happened had been different from mere Fading. Ignored, and moved on as best he could. Just for a little longer.

His mind kept returning to his last meeting with Lucius, driven there not only by the emptiness overhead but by the meaning of what had been said. Of names, and Names. What he and Zhijian had seen on the fate-stone had involved names, many of them, from the throats of mortals and of gods. The Grigori had stolen the Twin Crown's name, or destroyed it. A new Name was needed.

And when He returns, maybe, maybe...

A selfish thought, wasn't it? And yet he needed it, and the hope it provided. The writing of the Twin Crown's hand in that journal they'd found together had held one line that Tian Yue now clung to like a drowning man - Morbidity will be the gallows of all joy, cease it. There is hope.

There is hope.

If one being, one foul and loathsome being could take the Twin Crown's name, then surely the powers of the divine and mortals united could find a new Name, somewhere. Something to stick, something to define and restore. Names, names, everywhere. Names spoken to enter the Throne; the Name to conjure gods to jewels and to life again. No thought, no voice, no name, Void sat alone.

I am not Knowledge, and yet... Memories darted back and forth in Tien Lung's troubled mind, like fish diving deep and fearful of storms. That tongue, the First Tongue, the Old Tongue. It had been in the Crown's chronicling, the pages at the beginning that he could not read at the time. Yet now there were paths of memory open to him that had not been his at that time either. The oldest tongue doesn't come naturally to all tongues, if at all. It is too much of me, and does not disseminate except in single words. Too much of Him, of the Crown; a potent and ancient thing, not so much a language as mortals saw them but something more primordial, rooted in power. Echoes of the Song.

They are intuitive and creative words, and they have made some marvelous sights with them. Creative, there; that was the key... and hadn't Gianfar spoken to those gathered after the Grigori's attack? The language of Creation, yes. That had been in the reports, though its significance had been hidden until now. The Old Tongue, true names. Not a language to describe, but to define. To change a True Name was to change the Named, as the Grigori had.

The earliest pages of the Crown's written memories had been runes, burned mysterious onto the pages. Under Universe's hands - No, don't go that way. Wait a little longer.

I do not have time to seek out Knowledge now; I can only hope he too has intuited the need for Names, or learned of the Prophecy from Revei's creatures. Wasn't he close to Dream? Tian Yue shook his head. No. Memory is mine.

I can do this. The answer must be there if only I can sift it out.

Think, think, past the storm, deep down, where silvery hints from the past had buried themselves...

Seeking Names III - The Name of the Rose

The scene slipped away, only to be replaced by another one; still warm, illuminated by the bright joy of the First Days -

"I do not like this shape," he complained, from his place on the ground, nestled naked in the warm grass; his mane tumbled down his scale-less back. At least he still had his tail, and his horns. He didn't know how he would have borne it if it hadn't had his tail and horns. "It's too... squishy. Too small." He poked at his soft flesh with one ex-claw, annoyed.

"You can change back whenever you like," the Aoide attending him said, with a smile. "But this shape is much simpler for you to read and write."

"I suppose," he said, with a huff; breaking pens between his claws was not productive, nor was accidentally tearing the paper - and books, well. He wasn't going to think about the books. "Can I have it now, then?" He held out one forepaw and gave the Aoide a pained look; if he was going to be squishy, he at least wanted to get something out of it.

"Yes, you may." The Aoide held out the tome; it was written on leaves of Yggdrasil, like his Lord's book had been, but they wouldn't let him touch it with scales on, which was completely unfair - even if there had been that incident in the library. That had been an accident! It took him a moment to get a proper grip on the book, unused to the odd forepaws of the two-legged form, but once he had it firmly in his grasped he opened it eagerly.

Each page had a delicate line of runic script, the First Tongue, with explications next to it to indicate the meaning - pictograms, illustrations, and lines in the most widely used of the young languages. "It's... beautiful!" He ran one finger along the image of a rose, then along the lines of the script next to it. "How do you pronounce it?"

"The phonetics should be indicated, Lord Tien Lung." The Aoide bowed politely.

"Oh... hmm..." He peered at the words in the young languages. "Rose... hm..."

It took him a few tries, his tongue twisting around the odd, almost chiming phonetics of the First Tongue, but after a few false starts he said it properly - he must have, for the rose growing nearby rustled and tilted towards him as if he were the sun. "Oh!" The young Dragon King beamed. "How wonderful!"

"You have called it by name, so it cannot help but answer." The Aoide smiled.

"What's the next one?" He turned the page, eagerly. "Grass..."

Seeking Names V - Sound and Stroke

The book lay ready for his study, though as Tian Yue ran one pointed claw through the maze of the clasp, he felt a faint twinge of uneasiness that had nothing to do with the empty sky. Destruction had looked through ancient books for names, too, and apparently found nothing for his solace...

But I'm not looking for an old name. I'm trying to conceive a new one. He was here to rattle knowledge forcibly out of his mind and memories. The clasp clicked open under his fingers, and he opened the book quickly, as if it were a snake that might bite him, or run away and be lost forever. Nothing happened, of course, and he sighed, letting some of the tension fade. He gently turned the pages until he reached the preserved leaves at the very beginning. If the Old Tongue was 'too much of me' as the Twin Crown had written, surely the best source for his understanding was the Crown's hand itself.

The runes lay dark and shining on the page, as they had many, many ages before when a curious young dragon had asked about it. Tian Yue stared at them through narrowed eyes. I am more than I was before. I learned you, long ago, and now that ancient Tien Lung is me, completely.

Give up your secrets, in the Crown's n... no, for the Crown's name.

It was slow, very slow, like putting together a puzzle using only one's sense of touch. The runes stubbornly refused him for some time, until at last a single one matched with memory and clicked, the represented concept opening up in his mind. It was indeed nothing like any other language; he was not so much reading it as recognizing it and receiving concepts, images, emotion in return. It was giving him a headache. No wonder he hadn't been able to read it before; he couldn't imagine any but the most strong-minded of mortals being able to even conceive of it.

And yet, as he puzzled over the page before him, it seemed that was precisely what this particular writ was talking about - a mortal, a human, a woman; the rune called up all of this in his mind, captured the tilt of her head, the color of her hair. Even as Tian Yue tried to remain objective, to analyze the strokes and sound that made up the Tongue, so that he could try to evoke the Crown as completely as the runes evoked this woman, he nevertheless found himself drawn in. And there were other things, other names, too - his claws dug slightly into the floor at the reading of Void chaos ending nothingness Gehenna, and he tilted his head to one side at Pearl shining creation-jewel potential waiting.

The Old Tongue was not a means to describe something, but the description itself.

At last, at last, though he had very little idea of how long it had taken him -Xing Yun hasn't come yet, at least it's not time for the ritual - he had that page deciphered, the runes and their concepts dancing in his mind, laying out a story; shoving it down into a more common mode of thought and expression stripped away details, light and color and breath, but carrying the fullness of so much inside him at once made it very hard to concentrate on anything else.

As near as he could dizzily express it, the tale ran thusly:



He sat very still, absorbing this, then relaxed - letting it all go back, back onto the page where it belonged, to be trapped by the shining runes again. No wonder the Twin Crown had started writing, even though He could doubtless hold it all. Too much of Him, indeed.

The story was disquieting, but also useful. A balance, like that of the Crown... a balance within the Crown which had now been broken. Broken by a lover of Void. His eyes narrowed again. Regal Woman, is it? I wonder.

And yet, as intriguing as it was, that was not his purpose - but he held fast to the rune of the Woman, stored it away in his mind. If this audacious mortal was the same as the being that had caused such trials, then that might be useful as well. But right now, the most important thing was to name, to use the runes to chain the Crown, almost as the Manacles had.

This is... a tremendous and vastly dangerous knowledge, he thought, with an uneasy swish of his tail. It was a wonder that any had been taught it at all, but then if it was widely known, there could be countermeasures and foreknowledge. All that, if it had been existed, was now lost.

But I have it now. Grimly, Tian Yue sat down on the floor and began to read the passage again, this time picking at the runes themselves, at sound and stroke, so that he might understand them and bring them together in a pattern of his own.

On the Eve of Decision

The time has very nearly come.

Tian Yue couldn't have slept if he'd tried; the Dragon King paced around his chambers, his tail cracking behind him like a whip. It was almost time, that critical moment when everything they had seen, everything they had done, would come together. He fixed his mind on the image from the fate-stone of the Chrysalis unfolding like a flower, and the figure stepping out from within. This must Be. It must. It must.

He didn't know what he would do, otherwise. If they failed now, could they possibly recover?

No. Don't think about that. It will work. It will work. It has to work. Still, if it didn't, he doubted Gehenna would take 'but the fate-stone said so!' as an excuse.

He turned again, irritated at himself, and nearly ran into Penny. She stumbled, and he reached out and grabbed her shoulders, steadying her. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine. Thanks." Her smile was exhausted, and there were dark circles under her eyes. "You should sleep, or something."

"So should you." Tian Yue shook his head and gave one shoulder an encouraging squeeze before letting her go. "Sleep's not as important for me as it is for you."

"I..." She looked down. "Everything... will be okay, won't it? In the end?"

He hesitated. "Penny... I hope so. I dearly, dearly hope so."

"We all did so much," she whispered, her voice growing hoarse as she struggled not to cry. "But I'm still... so scared..."

"So am I," he admitted, reaching for her again, this time to embrace her. "But we have done well, all of us. I can feel the faith of those who believe all around me, like a warm, sweet tide. We have all gathered together for this, as we have not done in ages of the world."

She was crying now, her form shaking against his. "I don't want to... to..."

"I know," he whispered. "Nobody does. But don't think about that now. Don't go into this with fear in your heart. Go in with joy, and with faith. You have so much of both."

His robe was damp with her tears. "I'll try..."

"I saw the ritual preparations downstairs. They're beautiful. The God of Plague was there, too-"

She laughed at that, though it had a faint hysterical edge to it. "Doing what? Preaching to the germs?"

"No. He had prepared a special vaccine for us, for the gods, to protect against Void for a time - just as was in the fate-stone. The people of Baadris came, with lotuses, as was foretold. Everything is coming together just as said. If we follow the path..." He shook his head. "I'm nervous too, but we can't let fear cripple us. We're afraid it won't work, but we... we can't focus on that. We have to focus on our hope and our faith!"

Penny looked up at him, a faint grin on her face. "Who are you talking to? Me, or yourself?"

"Both," he admitted.

"Hm." Her expression turned soft, gentle. "I thought so."

"We'll make it," he repeated. "We will. I will protect everyone with my shields and my scales. You and Jax will carry the faith of the rest of the Cosmodrome refugees, Shartha and Evin will represent their people, even Lao Shu will come with the faith of the rat population. And hell, maybe Sh'khin was preaching to the germs and we'll have a microbe chorus." He laughed in spite of himself at the ridiculous mental image. "So we'll make it."

She nodded, and sniffled a little. "Yes. We will."

It wasn't very godly, perhaps, but he couldn't think of anything better or more appropriate. "So... let's do this thing!"

Penny laughed, genuinely this time. "Yes! Onward - to victory!"

Time to save the world.