Welcome to Gaia! ::

Chapter 1
The gallows were waiting patiently, but a broken prisoner’s death was soon to be stolen by starvation and the cold dark. The captive had no sense of the day since the sun was forsaken in her cell. She was melded to the splintering bench she sat upon by the ache and failing of her legs which had begun to pale. Any hope of dying with dignity had passed her by, and she was now hoping to no longer feel the grime in her tangled hair and grit along her hands. Anger kept her conscious.

The incarcerated woman couldn’t fathom why her allies hadn’t come to her rescue. Her father was likely to be the only man on the planet who believed in her innocence. He would do something, for he was capable of treason for his kin. Her plan had been to live long enough to have someone break her out, but it had been at least a month if not two. The Prisoner’s faith in rescue was dying too.

At the least, she couldn’t see herself in the dark. She couldn’t see her bruises and cuts, or her withering limbs. The only light can from the rare occasion that security guards slid a dish of bread and water through the metal bars in front of her… and the guards didn’t always remember to do so.

Alas! Today was a good day—someone was unbolting the stone door of the cell’s outer shell. Keys shifted and there was a crack of white light. The light grew and didn’t go out this time. A man came into the filthy stench of the room, neglecting to shut the security door. He approached her, and she blinked and rubbed her dry eyes. After a few moments she could see again.

“Ky?” A familiar voice asked her from five feet away. It was not that of a guard, and it was one she wasn’t pleased to hear speak her name. He curled a black glove around one of the dreadful bars that separated her from the free cavity of air and light in the room.

Ky said nothing, but lazily moved her head to look at him directly. She didn’t wish to have her last conversation be with the most arrogant, pompous, narcissistic, condescending, misogynistic louse in existence. She sank on her unwelcoming wooden plank. Ky could easily scrape together the rest of her strength to throw a rock at the megalomaniac, but didn’t have the heart for it.

She imagined she smelled like the corpse she’d end up as, to be seen like this by the repulsive prince was only another chip of shame. Ky looked up with her matted hair; his smooth, light face was tilted up in the usual prissy manner. His green eyes and long nose turned to her, with an unreadable expression.

Ky hated to lose to him, but she was certainly not going to win an ego battle today… although his glitzy, glittery and overly perfumed clothes weren’t on him today. He covered himself in a lined overcoat and a wide brimmed hat to hide his face. The prince wasn’t the kind of guy she wanted to hear her last words, but she was pathetically thrilled to see someone she knew in the flesh again… even it was this jerk.

Her father was the prince’s teacher in the military arts, but Ky’s encounters with Asaiyo were few and frustrating. Their first meeting was at a horridly fancy ball in which she was forced to take a dance with him. They were both seventeen. Their introductions were over when Ky made a point of stepping on his feet in retaliation.

She didn’t do it because of the prince, but to spite the proper code of conduct she was made to uphold by dancing with him in the first place. He said something fresh after that, and they loathed each other for the rest of their childhood. In their last encounter, prior to Ky’s running into the prince on Earth (and prior to becoming a fugitive), it was the eve of the Contest of Heroes. Her father was overseeing the great tournament and she went to watch.

Asaiyo was in the contest, and she had the misfortune to run into him. Ky ended their fussy argument by pouring a glass of wine on his shirt. Her father was furious at her for that, and a week later the prince sent her a bottle of champagne in a package. It ruined her skirt and made an awful mess when she discovered he had maliciously cracked the bottle just enough so as not to be detectable.

Something told Ky that she wasn’t going to get away with a prank this time. The memories made her smile for a second, but the prince would never have forgotten his ruined shirt just as she hadn’t forgotten his rotten remarks. Ky didn’t sense any resentment from the prince today, but it was impossible to predict what would come out of his mouth.

“Are you the murderer they call the ‘Sin Writer’ Ky?” The annoyingly posh accent of his deep voice was comforting.

“No Asaiyo.” She croaked at him.

The prince reached into his billowy fabric and tossed her a cold canteen of water. The energy she would’ve used to throw rocks was put into unscrewing the lid and gulping the contents. Ky didn’t worry for an instant about whether or not he was poisoning her.

“Better?”

“A bit better.” Ky could hear she sounded like a young woman again. “So Princey, what’re you here to bug me about on my death bed?”

“Back on Earth, there was that man… the one claiming to be… you know. Who was he?” There was something almost daresay, humble, about his statement.

“An old coot, but you wouldn’t believe me if I spilled my guts to you.” She rested her tired head on the wall behind her. “But if you see him, tell him to drop by.”

“Where can I find him?” Yes, something was definitely distressing Asaiyo.

“You can’t. But never mind me, are you possessed or something? No insults or fresh sarcasm today? You’d have a field day with the whole setting.” Ky laughed to herself, madly, but there was a pained look in the Prince’s visage. He stoically crossed his arms to hide it. The way his posture and height straightened made him seem like a judge. His older, blunt and logical way of talking returned to him, but his hand clenched the steel bar tightly.

“If I get you out of here, would you take me to him?” The Prince was desperate in a way, perhaps not all different from her own.

It was the last thing Ky expected—Prince Boy offering to help out... of all people!

He had been the one who captured her to begin with! As much as Ky wanted to get the hell out of Dodge, she knew that what he wanted wasn’t in her power to grant. She planned a white lie, but it wouldn’t leave her lips when she replied.

“No. The best I could do is to convince him to come see you.” She cursed herself for telling the truth. Ky watched the disappointment on his ivory face. It contorted and turned resolute before her.

“Alright. Your father is outside and waiting to take you somewhere safe. Don’t conveniently forget that you owe me now.” His large black hands took a loop of keys and in one long swoop, a key turned in the lock pad. The bird cage bars clicked open, making a wonderful open space in the light. Ky wondered if she was hallucinating.

“We must be quick! We don’t have more than six minutes before the guards change rounds.” The Prince was dead calm as he wrapped her in his giant overcoat and hat. He had a thick frock underneath, more to his style. Asaiyo grabbed her hand and yanked her through the underground cell blocks. Ky struggled to keep up with him as he flew up flights of stone stairs. Her legs moved in robotic response, as her mind was still in disbelief. Having to stop to unlock doors here and there ate up a lot of their precious time. The shifting of footsteps sounded in a corridor behind them.

Asaiyo swooped back and grabbed Ky while running like mad. He was slower since he was carrying her and it took him longer to unlock doors with only one free hand. It soon became apparent that they had gotten lost in the building and ended up above the ground floor.

Going back wasn’t an option since there were men running after them now. The prince shattered an outer window with a key and his elbow. Ky could finally tell that it was night outside, and very wet. The black coat shielded her from the shards that flaked everywhere. Asaiyo jumped on a shelf to kick out the rest of the glass.

He grabbed the window frame and swung both of them to the ground roughly. Due to the weight of two people, his grip on the frame was prematurely wrenched out. As a result, the prince landed on one heel unevenly in the slick mud He fell over backwards and Ky landed on top.

She had a searing pain of backlash from the fall, but Ky was thrilled to be outside again. She’d want nothing more than to fall over and sleep in her exhausted state, but supersonic alarms erupted from inside the prison. Lights blinked rapidly in tune to the swirling howl of the noise. Ky hopped off Princey in order to take cover in some nice trees up the looming hill side. Asaiyo brushed himself off and stumbled after her.

“Won’t be long till this area is crawling with police and bounty hunters,” the newly freed woman grumbled while buttoning up the coat across her torn and soiled shirt to keep out the cold of the night. It was too long for her and kept leaving tracks in the dirt, so she was forced to grab at it like the atrociously long evening gowns tradition forced her to wear long ago.

“Ashan is up that way.” The Prince pointed over the hill she was almost up. Ky turned around, realizing his feet had stopped. She ceased to hear the screaming alarms in the background for a second. She hadn’t considered what Prince-Boy was risking, or what he was going to have to give up.

“You’re not coming? You can’t just stand there and let them catch you!” Ky mounted the top of the hill under the sparkling stars, and it felt like she’d just climbed a mountain.

“I’m not the type to live on the run.” The Prince crossed his arms in another resolute manner. The trees around the pit he stood in were like the bars that caged her earlier against the slope of the hill. The haughty royal she’d always despised had just swapped places with her. She was freer than he at the moment, and it was painfully ironic.

Her feminine sense of compassion compelled her to reason with him, but a big hand gripped her shoulder from behind. A big elder with long tied hair smiled down on her. She threw herself on her father, and he picked her up as the Prince had done.

Asayio pushed at the air between them with an extended arm shouting to her father, “Go now! Take her and get out of here Ashan!”
She knew better than to waste time trying to change Asaiyo’s stubborn mind and made a promise instead. “I will do what I can for you Prince!” Ky pledged.