Backdated: July 1, 2014, 9:45 PM

She'd been to space twice. She had first gone with two of her limbs in a cast, her back on fire, and without her desire to. The second time she felt compelled to. She'd existed in space, where she should have died from lack of air. She'd gone hundred of thousands of miles away from earth to talk to a floating scroll and survived.

It made her curious of what her place of power might have been.

Themiscrya had been all but livid with her that she hadn't gone to her wonder, or even found her ring. Clearly this Wonder thing was important and a place she had to go. She would have gone that evening but, ah, well things went weird after the gathering with Mistral.

But that had been some days past now. She stared up at the night sky in jeans and a sweatshirt, very much Alex and not Andronicus. She'd found, since then, there was a hesitation in her heart. What if she was let down by what awaited her? What if it was in shambles and ruin and did not exist anymore? She shifted the headphones on her ears, nervous shuffling her feet on the roof of the apartment building.

There had been a time in her life when she'd wanted nothing more than magic to be real. She had tried grasping at it, consumed it in books and movies, and wrote about it in her own words. She'd tried to live vicarious through her characters, in such a way that maybe, just maybe she would wake up and have it manifested within her hands. Each time, she'd been let down and she believed just a little bit less. In her heart she may have never lost that belief, but if you'd asked her at the end of senior year, she would have said that 'nah, I gave that up.'

Alex felt so out of place in a world of machines and technology. Her soul called to a different plane of existence. Even now, even after becoming something of magic, she still felt out of place. The war she was thrust into, she felt no part of. She saw neither side as the winning side. She saw no end to it, to be honest. That made her an outlier. Alex had a soft spot for the Dark Mirror Senshi, one she couldn't explain to you if you asked. She felt no real home among the knights, nor the rest of the 'order', and 'chaos' wasn't something she was going to try to get cosy to right now.

Yet, she hesitated.

She had the chance to see where she came from, where her power came from, and she hesitated. The worries of the unknowns didn't scare her. She knew she'd come home; she'd come home from Mars. She wasn't afraid of the travel itself. Again she was living from going to Mars.

No, what she was afraid of was her own expectations.

She was afraid that her own mind would let her down, that her own soul would do her wrong. That she would expand the wonderment of her wonder, and arrive and be let down. She was afraid that her legacy, her past, was nothing but a lack luster mess of self defeat and destruction. She was afraid she would let herself down.

The music in her ears changed and she let it consume her. She stepped from the wall and spun, letting her emotions fuel her limbs. She spun on one foot, then swung the other in a sweep. Pique pique pique four five six seven eight. Preparation, pirouette, fuette, fuette, fuette, land. Drag nails up arms, battlement to the side into an allusion. Back bend, high fifth, layout. Arabesque, ponche. One two. Three four. Five six. Seven. Eight. Come up, elavey.

She came to a stop, reaching for the stars. Her hair floated down a split second after her body. Heart pounded in her ears, chest expanding with each heavy breath. The headphone slid from her ears and clattered around her shoulders, her hand still out stretched. The stars called to her now. They beckoned, they whispered for her. If she could only reach, if she could only reach. The wind tore at her clothing, changing it, melding it until she stood not as Alexandra but as Andronicus.

Her fingers tensed and she felt something pool in her palm like air. It may have just been the tension of her skin being pulled taut, or something else together, but it settled within her palm with the weight of her mace.

Please... this once... I beg of you... let it be real... Her eyes fluttered closed and words began to fall from her mouth, words she did not know she knew.

"I pledge my life and loyalty to Uranus, and to Andronicus. I humbly request your aid, so that in return I may give you mine."

---

The warmth hit her first. Dry heat sank into the folds of her pants and top, warming her chilled skin. She was blinded by the sheer amount of light that enveloped the area. It took many minutes for her eyes to adjust; she took the time to simply soak up the heat in her limbs. It was summer on Earth, but nights were cold and she wore rather loose clothing for her nightly patrols. Here though, here it made sense. On a planet this warm - a concept that still boggled her mind, given its distance from the sun (and shouldn't it be a gaseous planet to begin with?!) - heavy coats and furs would suffocate you. You wanted coverage, but not to die of heat stroke. Common desert nomad gear. She'd seen enough movies about things in deserts to know you didn't go in a heavy jacket unless you wanted to boil your insides.

It was not that there was a fair amount of light, she realized as she looked around. The sky was dark, but not black, and she could see into the dunes of sand that stretched for miles. A stone rode could be just seen over the nearest dune, heading away from her. Otherwise, she was isolated out here. The reason for the light, however, was the giant tower in front of her. What little light was filtering through the atmosphere - again, something that boggled Andronicus because she could breath - was being reflected off the giant sandstone building, making it a beacon in the middle of no where. Probably a good thing, to be honest.

The tower it self was an impressive piece of architecture --


--"Yes, yes I know. It stands at fourteen stories, thirty feet in diameter. I've been over this a million times, ser." She let out a huff, shifting on the stone dais of a courtyard that stood outside. She idly twisted the signet ring around her finger; it was a nervous habit, really. Having found it far earlier than her ser was expecting, in the sand outside of all places, she'd kept it as a memento of her progress. She glanced up at her predecessor, who gave her a look. She continued with a sigh. "While it is thirty feet in diameter, three ten foot sections jut out at the cardinal directions of Earth. The east and west sections simply allow air flow through the building and are lined with stained glass that are protected by the magic of the building and planet. The tops of these sections are covered with moving plates, so when sandstorms come, they can be closed and protect the inside of the tower. They were also added by my grandfather's grandmother, once too many books had been destroyed by sand. The northern section holds the spiral stair case that we use to change between floors. The southern 'section' is simply the front door."

"You've learned well, my Page." He handed her an ornate key, one she took with gentle hands. "You know which floor to go to, yes? And that you will explore the rest in time?" She nodded quickly, eager to begin her virgil among her Wonder. He patted her on the head and kissed her fatherly. He gave a nod and a smile, crinkling the corners of his eyes. It was time.

She stood at the large oaken door and --

Andronicus blinked a few times, swaying. What the... She stared up at the tower. It was battered, it was half buried in a dune, but she could see the outcroppings on the sides. The glass had long since been blown out, though one floor was entirely intact it seemed. One, two, three... tenth floor (or ninth if the bottom floor was "ground"). She wondered how it survived. The twelfth floor was the same. How very odd.

Virgil... what virgil needed to be completed? Something had happened here, at a much younger age. But... what? Andronicus stepped up to the oaken door, battered but whole. She needed a key for this right? An ornate looking silver key. She ran her fingers against the wood and the door shifted. Upon closer inspection, she pushed the door open without effort. The hinges creaked softly and she crossed the threshold.

The place was a disaster. The room must have been used as an entrance way at one point in the tower's life, from the tattered curtains that littered the walls to the destroyed paintings on the walls. Half the room was completely filled in with sand. The door to the north to the... staircase? was battered and hung off it's hinges. It was an odd contrast to the completely solid front door. She stepped around the sand and made her way to the door. Andronicus rubbed the fourth finger of her right finger to find nothing. Obviously she found nothing. Why would she--

Wait the ring! She should have a ring! Themiscrya had mentioned it and told her to find it. But where... if it was buried under all the sand it was a lost cause. Andronicus spent half an hour looking in the entrance floor, pushing sand out of the way and out the door, checking behind curtains, to no avail. She huffed. While she could see the rest of the floor now, there wasn't space to hide a tiny silver ring. The window sills slanted towards the floor ( probably to help with sand build up), and the curtains barely held themselves up much less anything else. The doors held no compartments, and the staircase door all but broke as she touched it. Andronicus carefully moved the pieces of broken door to the side. No need to have them come down on her when trying to get up the stairs.

The stairs themselves were made of sandstone as well, and spiraled up. The stair case stood in the middle of the room; the stairs themselves were only about three feet wide. It took up a good portion of the room, but still with space around it. Probably for air flow at one time. Now, sand piled high in the space, spilling over the beautifully crafted metal railings that snaked their way up. She looked up and slowly started up the stairs. There had been something about a floor she could get to, but only one. Maybe her ring was there.

The trek was slow going. Numerous stairs were hidden behind piles of sand, and more than once did she find herself almost face planted into the stone. The first five doors did not budge. Doors on six and seven weren't even approachable. The landing of seven lay broken in the landing of six, broken clean off at the door jam. The eighth's door knob didn't even jiggle when she tried to open it. It was either so caked with sand, or it had fused with the door jam in the heat.

The ninth door swung open for her, almost before she'd touched the handle. The gesture was eriey, as though the floor was welcoming her. To what, exactly? The Page stepped through the door into the rest of the room and took a moment to let out a breath. It was what could be best described as a library, with walls and walls of books. A heavy table sat in the middle of the room, about four feet across. A few chairs littered the room. The piles of sand here were small and kept primarily to the small balcony sections in the east and west sides. This room looked all but intact.

A glittering caught her eye on the table. She curled her fingers around the source of the glittering; a small silver ring with a tower and the symbol of Uranus on it. It was incredibly simple, with little details of wind currents on the sides. All around the inside were symbols she recognized as Greek.

"Αφήστε τον αέρα να σας καθοδηγήσει." Whatever that meant.

She turned her eyes towards the maps on the table. Half of them were hidden under each other, a few were torn, and others were draped over the books. She reached to touch one of them.

"They come!"

Terror flooded her system and she backpedaled from the table. It was the same fear she'd woken up to in that nightmare, the same fear that left her screaming at night. She was in danger. They wouldn't get to her fast enough, she'd be on her own. She had to get out, she had to get out. She, she sh---

She slammed the door shut behind her and felt the fear melt away. The staircase in front of her was still, silent, but comforting. The young woman did not look back as she hurried down the stairs and out of the stairwell. She closed the door behind her to the tower and instinctually thought of home.

--

Dawn broke the horizon as she swiveled the ring around her finger, staring up at her ceiling. It took until noon for the panic in her chest to finally fade away, and she did not sleep until well into the next night.

Just what had happened in that room...


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