Only the crack of lightning breaks the ominous silence. His whole life had been spent mastering the absence of emotion, reliance on logic, and application of statistics. From his cradle he had been taught that fear, vengeance, pride, love—they all clouded judgment and subsequently broke down leadership. But for all that teaching, but for all those beliefs and mores engrained in his mind, a small part of Soleron, a part deep down and hidden to others, felt afraid.
"I am a deity, my old friend," Arcanza said, an icy cold, empty, crystalline glare focused directly on him. He wore the garments of an Omnian lord, black and violet silk, except for where the holy seal should be was a replica, depicting a twisted image of three hands reaching for a single light source. The cape twisted in the silent wind blowing in through the shattered crystiglass window. "The very god whom legions on both this world and ours worship." The murderer turned around condescendingly and laughed to himself. "Ah, yes, concerning the fate of our planet, Omnis. The truth compliments all I have told you. Think about it through logic: Would the OmniTech powers that thwart my plans at every twist and turn even be functional if Meridian-Omega had truly gone supernova and was destroyed?"
Soleron felt his defensive shell get thrown up, and heard himself say in the distance, "OmniTech is drawn from the Hypercoins, not the Central Star."
"Limitless power comes from Meridian-Omega. I infiltrated the Solar Research Projects, I was at Nyru's side when he stated his hypothesis, and I know it. The star is a focal point for stray energy in the universe. By making it go nova, I planned to harness all of that energy and fulfill the Trinity of Darkness's ultimate goal." Arcanza's hair hung to his shoulders, unaffected by the air currents entering before him, as dark and lifeless as his heart. "But being a power magnet, all of the energy it released immediately returned, causing an implosion rather than an explosion, sucking itself and our homeworld into a parallel universe, leaving nothing but what we now call the Nexus." His voice softened, became almost...vulnerable. "Yes, the Nexus. A door to unending time and space. All of the work I have done on Omnis, New Omnis, Earth, and countless other planets has been nothing more than preparation for an expedition through that door, where I would find Infinity itself. There I would also find the other two beings of the Trinity, unite with them, and plunge all existence into an eternal age of darkness."
With the words "age of darkness" echoing in his head, Soleron jerked upright in bed, gasping for air, acutely aware of the cold sweat beading his face and chest. Slowly his eyes gained focus, his ears stopped ringing, his metabolism settled to normal once more. Lying next to him, Seraide shifted uncomfortably, and he put a hand on her shoulder to lend her a bit of reassurance as she suffered through her own nightmare of the events on Earth. Arcanza was a liar.
But Rapture Legion was still active on New Omnis. That was the one crack that worried Soleron, and the one thought that gnawed in his conscious. If Arcanza had told the truth about that, could the rest have been...?
Seeing Seraide had calmed down, Soleron slid out of their bed and stood, stretching to warm and ready his muscles for training later on. They had arrived at New Omnis a full week ago, but much to their dismay Rapture Legion had already made their move, and those still loyal to Feilia were forced underground. No matter where Meridian Eye VIII landed, the High Lady insisted, they would be surrounded and annihilated. Something about that probability also bothered him. There was no way they could seize control of the whole planet in under two weeks, without help from someone or something very powerful.
He dressed in black pants, held up by a leather belt, tucked in a dark red long-sleeved shirt, and completed his outfit with a long black coat that hung to his knees. Behind that coat is where he hid his Point Navigator and plasma blaster. Pricking his finger with the needle on the blaster, Soleron gave the weapon enough plasma to convert into energy for twenty shots, the maximum this early model could store.
"Sole?" whispered Seraide as he opened the door to leave.
"I will be back soon," he promised. "I just need a walk."
She smiled, her face illuminated by the light from the ship's corridors falling into their small room, and told him, "Not too long."
As he walked along the circling corridor, Soleron would catch glimpses of a crewman or woman here and there, always suspiciously turned as though they were watching him. Their looks were not the ones he was used to—when he was on Omnis, for example, people would stare at him either in awe or fear, because it was common knowledge that the Omni Rangers stood for the protection and preservation of the planet, but it was also common knowledge OmniTech directly affected your psyche and eventually rendered a user almost totally insane after twenty-five seminovas. Even though he had been frozen for twenty, Soleron and the others' lives were sustained with the devices and, added to the five years they had served a dying Taerys and a vengeful Oriquin, their limit had crept too close too soon. He often wondered if any of them would begin to show signs of insanity what he would do. The probabilities for such a thing were small but possible.
Reaching the double doors at the end of the upward-spiraling hallway, Soleron placed his hand on the TGP panel and requested, "Access."
"Access denied," Meridian Eye VIII's computer replied. "Bridge access for Soleron Naelra revoked at 0100-11101999."
Soleron frowned, the simple message registering in his mind and integrating itself into his collective suspicions. "A reason or comment for the revoking?" he asked it.
The machine answered, "No third parties allowed on bridge eight hours prior to landing procedure initiation."
"Landing procedure," Soleron repeated, and broke into a run as he turned around and headed back toward the others' quarters. The crew was now strangely missing and nothing so much as stirred as the ex-Ranger reached the room Talyserys and Pyrial shared and pressed his hand on the solid black panel. "Access."
"Access denied."
The denial sealed his decision. Rushing back to his own room, he again attempt to gain entry and was denied. Slipping his plasma blaster out, he fired shot after shot, each at a different location in the door, some places denting the metal and some places burning holes along the edge. When his twenty shots were out, he executed a powerful kick, knocking the large metal door down into the room.
Seraide jumped out of bed in her nightgown, exclaiming, "What is going on? Sole?"
"Get dressed," he ordered. "Get equipped."
Further down the corridor, a sound like a scream accompanied the smell of white-hot steel, and Talyserys emerged from his own sealed room, with the green Lifeblade humming in his hand, through the perfectly rectangular hole he had cut using it. Pyrial was behind him, sliding crystiglass-laced gloves over his hands that would give his punches reinforced power.
With four sharp, precisely timed swings, Talyserys cleaved another entrance, this one into Laurasia's room, and Pyrial hurried inside to rouse her.
As Seraide emerged from her room, Soleron took her hand and squeezed it, partly to comfort her and partly to distract his mind from the throbbing pain kicking the door left in his foot. "What happened, Soleron?"
"Our access privileges have all been stripped, and the crew is initiating a landing sequence soon," he explained to everyone as Pyrial and Laurasia came out into the corridor. "I am fairly certain this entire situation is a trap."
Suddenly the crew onboard Meridian Eye VIII emerged from one side, followed closely by the other, surrounding the five ex-Rangers. Laurasia activated her warp-blade and braced herself to use it. Pyrial and Talyserys readied their weapons as well. Soleron pricked his finger again for twenty more blasts.
"So, it's taken you this long, has it?" Feilia demanded as she appeared among the mass of Legionnaires closest to Soleron. Slowly her face seemed to melt away and re-form as someone else entirely, not the facial features of a man or a woman, but something entirely different, then quickly snapped back to a woman with piercing pink eyes, long black hair, and a deceivingly soft complexion.
Pyrial hissed, "Akai," and lifted his fists.
"Please, Pyrial," Akai laughed, "you couldn't hit me forty years ago and you can't hit me now. I'm with Rapture Hold now, a collection of the universe's thirteen most fearsome warriors, assassins, and monsters."
"And you're carrying on Arcanza's legacy? Resurrecting the Legions, reviving the Trinity, restructuring the universe?" Pyrial beckoned her to move closer, but she remained stationary. "Oh, I'll hit you alright. As many times as I need to knock some sense into you."
Akai smiled, pointing to the monitor embedded in the ceiling above them displaying a static image of their surroundings, with the planet New Omnis growing larger and larger. "We have begun the landing sequence. Our orders are to have you dead by the time we arrive."
Handing the blaster to Seraide, who took it with a trembling hand but looked ahead with hard steel eyes, Soleron fell into an attack stance and embraced the adrenaline coursing his system. His vision remained clear but numbers began to form in the back of his head, calculations and statistics telling him where a quick attack would work best to free them from being surrounded. The numbers, however, were unfavorable, and he knew his team would have to do something desperate if they were to survive.
"Since we are already dead," Seraide spoke in the low, empty tone of someone who knew she was defeated as she lowered the plasma blaster, "will you tell us whose orders you are following?"
Placing an elbow-length white-gloved hand over her mouth, Akai laughed deeply at the request, as though it were made jokingly, then settled herself down so uncomfortable silence reigned once more. Some Legionnaires had made brief noises or snickered but fell back into line immediately before the Rapture Holder noticed.
Pyrial demanded, "What's so funny about that?"
"Hope is funny," Akai answered. "You still think you have the option of escaping and you are trying to pry information out of me."
"We do not need your information," Soleron informed her in an attempt to bring her mood down before they were ambushed and slaughtered. "This is a Solar Research Ship, which means you are being led by one of those former solar scientists. Mnsomey and D'Aretiv I know, for a fact, are dead. Lord Oriquin and Prince Hopwood crushed Arcanza on Earth. The only logical conclusion is that Corout has somehow survived, maintained Rapture Legion on New Omnis, and has been assembling you and other manpower while Arcanza kept us and the new Omni Rangers occupied elsewhere. Sometimes this entire war seems to be centered around distraction tactics and destruction."
With a smile other men would find seductive, Akai met Soleron's intense stare and emanated an aura of what was almost satisfaction. "Corout called himself the Destroyer's Hand. Therefore, we are Rapture Hold."
In the exact instant her final syllable left her mouth Soleron surged forward to grab each of Akai's arms with one of his hands and pull them back as he slid behind and disabled her. "Drop your weapons or she dies," he instructed the Legionnaires.
All at once, the Legionnaires' weapons fell to the ground, hitting it with a metal thunk as Akai screamed angry, "Stop, fools! I am willing to die! Carry out Corout's orders and kill them!"
The next moments unfolded at once. Pyrial jumped into the crowd of Legion men and women behind him, swinging his fists and following through with powerful jumping and spinning kicks. Sometimes when the crystiglass gloves connected with one of them the sound of breaking bone was coupled with an agonized scream. Talyserys's large form moved surprisingly gracefully, gliding forward into the group of Legionnaires behind Soleron and Akai and using the shimmering green Lifeblade to cut through them or pierce them through the heart. Seraide turned in circles, firing the plasma blaster at the head of any Rapture Legion member reaching down to pick up their weapons. Laurasia proceeded closely behind Pyrial, noting any person he would knock down and thrusting the warp-blade into their neck to permanently paralyze them. She also caught the few he missed on his fierce assault and handled them.
Akai shifted her shape, changing into a short and rotund little man with a bushy moustache and balding head who stood only to Soleron's waist, then scrambled out of his choke hold and away from him. She changed again, this time into a lean, thoroughbred horse, and ran at high speed away from the battle. Soleron watched her escape, then hurried over to Seraide and commandeered the plasma blaster, pricking his finger yet again to recharge its blood-based power. Taking aim, he fired consecutive shots, without missing, killing twelve more Legionnaires and ending the suffering of the last eight already paralyzed. All in all, some fifty of Arcanza and Corout's followers lay still on the cold ground, descending into whatever hell the Lineage had prepared for them.
"Talyserys, Laurasia, stay here and clean house," ordered Soleron. He drew blood with the needle a fourth time and handed the blaster to Talyserys in exchange for a now-inactive Lifeblade and Laurasia's warp-blade. Soleron handed the Lifeblade to Pyrial, who sheathed it in the empty slot where he used to keep his own before it had become property of the backstabbing Michael Tracer, and kept the blade for himself. "Seraide and I will take this direction," he explained, pointing down the corridor Akai had fled. "Pyrial will go the other. There is no telling where she will turn up. If you find her..."
The look in Pyrial's watercolor blue eyes was pain, unmistakable pain. "I won't hesitate, Sole," he swore. "She works against our Lineage, now, and must be stopped." Turning in mid-sentence, he ran at a careful pace away from the others.
"Akai and Pyrial have a history," Soleron explained to the others, because he was unaware if they knew every detail about their teammate's past. "His father was an artist and, from before his birth, Akai had been his father's model. Her shape-shifting ability obviously offered an unlimited range of subjects. Eventually his father left his mother for Akai, which opened a significant feud among his family, but being pure of heart Pyrial could never act on his rage and ended up forgiving her and his father."
Seraide sighed, holding onto Soleron's arm with both hands, and asked, "Are you afraid Pyrial is going to repeat his past? That he will forgive her again and allow her to escape?"
"The probability in that direction is strong," Soleron answered. "But there are some factors that no mathematic equation can predict."
As he lifted up two lifeless bodies and moved toward his living quarters, Talyserys laughed in a low and mirthless rumble. "Just when I think this war cannot get any bloodier," he remarked grimly, "Soleron learns to use the heart as a weapon."
Without answering, Soleron turned around and broke into a medium-speed run down the corridors of Meridian Eye VIII, with Seraide close behind him off to the side. As he scanned the areas, he would reach a closed door that would not open for him, so he thrust the warp-blade into the crack of the door and used its powers to teleport inside and examine the room, then repeated the procedure to exit. As he continued this searching blitz, Arcanza's voice screamed in his memory, "Age of darkness!"
Finally, hunger and exhaustion began to catch up with him, as it inevitably always did, and he removed his black jacket to make his clothing lighter. "Here," Seraide said as she handed him an electrolyte drink she pulled out of her satchel.
The on-board computer instantly sprang to life, announcing, "Landing procedure initiated. Estimated time of arrival is fifteen minutes."
"She has to do that manually from the bridge!" exclaimed Seraide.
"Hurry," Soleron hissed, throwing the empty can to the side and turning around to run in the opposite direction. He held back enough adrenaline so Seraide could keep pace with him and in a very short time they were back near their quarters. Laurasia was coming out of the room while Talyserys was carrying the last three victims inside. "Move!" Soleron snapped. "Akai is at the bridge!" The two runners paused to wait for their companions then, as part of a group of four, continued their rush.
In what had to be a record time, Soleron and the greater part of his team reached the entrance to Meridian Eye VIII's bridge from the opposite side of the spaceship. The door was already sliced open in a sloppy rectangle. Soleron leaped across the still-searing slab of metal that used to be a door now sitting on the ground and, as the first one inside, was the first to see Pyrial standing face to face with Akai, back in her original form.
"You are going to kill me?" Akai snickered in disbelief. "Child, you did not have the courage to stand up to me then and you do not have the courage to stand up to me now. Especially now that I am one of the thirteen strongest beings in the universe."
Pyrial lifted the Lifeblade in both hands, its bright green energy-formed blade casting a frightening reflection in his same old watery eyes. He appeared on the verge of crying, but what was uncertain is whether the tears would come from killing or from his inability to kill. Next to him, Talyserys lifted the plasma blaster and aimed for Akai's forehead, but Soleron lashed out and struck his arm, knocking the weapon out of his hand.
"Tell me, please," Pyrial whispered.
"Tell you what?" Akai demanded. "Why I satisfied your father a million times more than your prude of a mother ever could?"
"Why you joined Arcanza," he answered in a hard voice. "Why you work for Corout and everything we stand against."
Akai smiled and reached out to stroke Pyrial gently on the cheek already stained with a falling trail of tears. "We want to bring it back, of course. It wants to re-shape the core of reality into darkness and suffering for those who do not follow the Trinity and into paradise and bliss for those who do."
"The Lineage offers paradise, too," he challenged.
"The Trinity has shown me its power, and proven itself to me," she replied without thought or hesitation. To Soleron, it seemed as though the words that came out were the result of brainwashing rather than rational thought.
Pyrial drew the Lifeblade back, leveling the handle with his eyes and aiming the active blade at Akai's heart. "I will prove the Lineage's power to you!" he screamed, blinking the moisture out of his eyes. The shapeshifter laughed wickedly in a high pitched voice that, reflected in echo off the walls of the bridge, sounded sick and forlorn.
A single burst of energy sounded and an energy blast struck one side of Akai's head, knocking it limply to the left and redirected the shot to hit her shoulder blade, that ricocheted once more and pierced her evil heart before dissipating. Slowly Pyrial turned his head toward the origin of the sound and saw Soleron standing, his arm still extended and plasma blaster still pointing. "The Trinity of Darkness puts unfair stresses on us all," he said in his trademark grandiose way. "Even so, I will not use your heart as a weapon."
"Thank you," Pyrial mouthed the words. He dropped the Lifeblade, causing the green energy to vanished, and fell to his knees struggling to catch his breath, staring at Akai's dead body.
"Entering New Omnis atmosphere," the computer reported. "Velocity is now locked as requested. Prepare for impact in thirty seconds...twenty-nine..."
"Damn it!" Soleron screamed, rushing to the controls and kicking the corpse out of his way. "If she truly locked the velocity, we're going to hit the ground at this speed."
As if in answer to some unspoken prayer, the monitor above the control lit up in a bright white color, a black silhouette emerging in the center. "My ship has docked onto yours," the mystery person informed them. "If you hurry to your emergency exit, we can make it."
"...twenty-one...twenty..."
Seraide appeared as though she were about to hesitate, but Soleron pointed in the direction of the emergency exit and ordered forcefully, "Go!" As the three other Omnians scrambled to reach the hatch that led outside Meridian Eye VIII, Soleron hurried over to Pyrial, lifting to support him and draping his friend's arm around his shoulders, and carried him to the exit as well. Talyserys pulled the hatch open and pushed Laurasia and Seraide through before swinging himself out of the bridge. Soleron shoved Pyrial into the hatch more violently than he would have wished, then scrambled through the opening himself.
"...twelve...eleven..."
The five Omnians found themselves in a smaller and tighter ship, with an unidentifiable figure wearing a dark wine-colored cloak at the piloting controls. "Detaching Hypegon Shadow from Meridian Eye VIII," he dictated, explaining what he was doing as he did it. "Launching microwave destruction missile. Hold tight." A powerful explosion resonated too close for comfort, and the ship was tossed into a hard right turn that the pilot fought to recover from. Regaining stability, he maneuvered the ship into a smooth course and reported, "Meridian Eye VIII destroyed before collision with New Omnis."
"He saved the innocent lives on the ground," Seraide whispered to Soleron. "Should we trust him? We thought Akai was Feilia at first..."
Soleron stood up slowly and moved in front of the others as they, too, put in an effort to stand and focus their attention on their unknown savior. "Landing on the ground now," he told them. Gently the small craft reduced its speed and bounced once as it touched New Omnis below.
"Thank you for your assistance," Talyserys spoke as the roar of the engines faded to a mystifying silence. "Lineage shine on you." He bowed deeply.
The cloaked man turned around to look at the Omnians and replied, "Lineage shine on you, also, Father Talyserys," with a deep bow of his own. "All of you as well, Pyrial, Laurasia, Princess Seraide, and Soleron Naelra."
To his teammates, the stranger's knowledge of names and titles was a stunning revelation, but it barely fazed Soleron, who instantly bowed his response to the blessing. Placing his fist over his heart he intoned with dangerous pride, "Starborn. Honor-bound. Lineage shine on you also, Master Eztram."
Laurasia gasped. Pyrial wiped what remained of his tears off of his face. Talyserys muttered disbelief under his breath. Seraide gaped openly. Soleron remained absolutely still as the cloaked figure reached up to grab the garment from his shoulder and fling it off into a corner of Hypegon Shadow. Eztram, the man who wielded the Red Ranger OmniTech Ability Band before Soleron, Craig Hopwood, or Cecil Mercuric, the man who served the deceased High Lord Taerys with unmatched vigor and dedication, the man who raised, trained, and disciplined Soleron to be a life-long soldier and Oriquin to be a life-long ruler at the same time, stared back at the group of ex-Omni Rangers. "Enough formality," he remarked.
"Of course," Soleron agreed, relaxing his position into one more comfortable.
"Welcome back to New Omnis," Eztram addressed them, pushing the lever that opened the door of Hypegon Shadow to reveal the brown and gray world outside. "I wish I could give you a more warm welcome, but the current situation leaves no room for that. Rapture Legion has revived itself under new leadership."
He disembarked swiftly and motioned the others to follow, which they did just as quickly and smooth as their legendary mentor. Once outside, Eztram lifted a remote control and the ship rose up into the cloudy sky and vanished as an invisibility field enveloped it.
"We can talk safely at my house in that grove," he told them, pointed toward a virtual forest of dead and dying deciduous trees and some evergreens that still clung to dusty life.
Soleron nodded and followed Eztram into the maze with his allies close behind. "There is much to talk about," Soleron said with a hard face. "I am afraid that even though Arcanza is dead, our mission remains unfinished. An age of darkness is closing in on us all."
Original Publication Date: 18 October 2001
