EHYEH-ASHER-EHYEH (I AM THAT I AM): An Elena Duran/Corazon Negro
Vi Moreau (vmoreau@directvinternet.com)
Wed, 25 Sep 2002 12:36:52 -0400
Ehyeh-Asher-Ehyeh (I am that I am) 31.1/34
Julio Cesar divad72@prodigy.net.mx
Vi Moreau vmoreau@directvinternet.com
Lilitu swung her sword quickly up, blocking the blow. Zarach's sai cleaved
into the blade, its big steel tooth sinking into it, catching there,
holding.
Both Immortals gritted their teeth, jaw muscles clenched, as they struggled
with their interlocked weapons. Inadvertently, they simultaneously put their
muscle into a sideways motion that sent the weapons sailing out of both
their grasps, sliding across the rocky ground.
Instinctively, both Immortals backed away, facing each other. Lilitu spoke
in an ancient language. "And so the eternal warriors meet again. Now, we
shall see what the Gods have in mind for us."
"Let's find out," Zarach answered.
They advanced toward each other, Zarach with fists raised, Lilitu with hands
poised as if to strangle him; but her hands closed into fists as the two
Immortals did hand-to-hand battle across the cavern ground, skirting the
crevice that might claim either or both. Viciously, relentlessly, they
exchanged punches, kicks, elbows and backhands, drawing blood, and though
the eyes of both glittered with fury, burned with hatred, they seemed to
share a peculiar respect, of a sort known only between worthy foes.
Suddenly an earthquake-like tremor interrupted them, freezing them both in
midpunch. The tremor continued, the cavern trembling around them. "The
Dream, Mother!" Zarach announced. "The Dream is going to destroy this
place!"
"I know," Lilitu said, slamming a right hook into Zarach's jaw, sending him
reeling into the wall. Wiping blood from the corner of his mouth with one
hand, Zarach with the other grabbed his two weapons. But he did not move
forward, not yet; his expression... again, that peculiar respect was at
play... told his opponent that the time had come to up the ante of their
deadly Game.
Lilitu nodded, and stepped over, grabbing her sword.
Then the two Immortals began to circle, like gladiators in the Coliseum,
looking for the right moment, seeking an opening. When they went at each
other, each blow, and every clang of bronze against steel, was lighting
quick, expertly placed, two warriors perfectly matched, while around them
the cavern shook, rumbled, with the approach of the Dream.
Zarach, frustrated by how even this match was, stoked the fires of his fury,
remembering that Lilitu was the creature responsible for the death of
hundred of Immortals. He screamed and leapt forward and hammered at Lilitu,
startling her, staggering him, Lilitu meeting his blows but getting battered
back as all around them the cavernous walls shook with their own fury.
Lilitu forced herself forward, and blade was pressed against tridents,
scythe-kissing scythe, as the two fighters stood locked in a warrior's
embrace, locking metal. Respect and affection forgotten, nothing but hatred
burned in the gaze of both Immortals, each staring into the other's eyes.
Zarach instinctively backed away from Lilitu; and she did the same from him.
Then Lilitu changed her strategy, and logic be damned-she ran right up the
face of the walls, like an oversize spider. At once repulsive and regal,
Lilitu held her head high even as its insect-like movement dragged her
scratchily like fingernails on the blackboard of the cavern walls.
Lilitu lashed down at Zarach with her sword. He dove out of the way, and the
blade swung through one ancient limestone pillar, shearing it, turning it to
dust. She moved forward, and as Zarach turned, a huge hit swung around and
sent him flying toward the chamber again.
Zarach slammed up against a cave wall that, fortunately, was smooth and
didn't impale him on any sharp rocks, merely jolted every bone and muscle in
his body. Getting painfully to his feet, catching his wind, pulling himself
together, he grabbed his weapons more strongly.
The mighty sword of Lilitu swung around and pulverized the wall, missing
Zarach's head by inches, inspiring him to leap out of the way in a dive that
became a roll, and when he popped to his feet he was standing before the
wall he'd been slammed into moments before. But Lilitu's blade whipped
around him from the ceiling, and once again Zarach dove out of the way.
This time, however Zarach counterattacked. Striking upwards, one of his sai
sank deeply into Lilitu's chest, though her demigoddess-half's heart,
sending her skittering back, screaming in surprise and pain and fury, a cry
at once animal and, eerily, human. Lilitu, weaving drunkenly, gazed down at
Zarach in anger and agony, dripping blood on his face, bellowing what would
have been a battle cry if the Goddess had not been dying.
Zarach-ignoring his own pain, gritting his teeth-stared back at her. "Your
life ends now! I will see you in hell!"
Lilitu's eyes widened as the final blow came to her. As the second sai
entered and raped her neck, it exploded into black vapor. Zarach covered his
face with an arm, but hurtful fragments of skull went flying, sailing chunks
of his flesh. Instantly, Lilitu's corpse hit the ground, barely missing her
killer.
The reaction was immediate: a vaporous charge spread out from Lilitu's neck,
around her arms, and a crackling electrical charge hummed and passed across
the entire chamber in a flickering blue wave.
Zarach felt only a mild throbbing-no pain yet-and looked around in wonder:
the process had somehow cleaned the stoned-walls of their mold and
fungus-the chamber was a gleaming cave for the first time in countless
centuries. He reared back as the electrical storm clinging to the walls came
rushing by him, wiping the walls clean in its wake.
Zarach just focused on the Quickening. The lightning flew in the air like
angry serpents. The light was alive, was crawling over him, through him,
inside him. For a moment he thought the worst was yet to come. Then the
shadows returned. Again the grumbling darkness was hit by a lightning.
Blinking, disconcerted by the supernatural transformation taking place in
the cave, Zarach steeled himself. A shriek of agony both physical and
emotional rang through the limestone temple of the Island of Nod.
As if in reply-negative reply at that-a terrible sound, a sort of
rumble-edged groaning, made its way into the chamber from the outer tunnels.
A spasm, as expected electric-lightning, shook Zarach's body. Pain sent him
to his knees, and he howled in impotent rage as his very spirit was sucked
from him, withering him.
Zarach began shaking violently, straining against the wall. Somehow he
remained conscious through whatever agony he was feeling, but his teeth
ground through his lips. Veins stood out his neck. He heard himself scream
at the pain as the ground sped by under him.
The Quickening raped his soul. At its touch, electrical explosions occurred
in Zarach's brain, taking him away from the cave. A whole new world was
built around him, and all five of his senses were plugged into it. For the
moment the only real thing to him was the underground chamber of his mind.
Across from him was a deep, dark throat of a tunnel that belched
forth-gurgling noises. Everything in Zarach screamed at him to run, but he
was mesmerized by the sound of the gurgling growing quickly and steadily
louder. Dark liquid exploded out from the tunnel in a scarlet-tinted rush,
revealing itself to be a roiling wall of blood racing for him. The blood of
the Immortals dead in Lilitu's Game.
His mind filled with pain and dying, fueling itself with only the thought of
drinking the energy till he could hold no more. The taste of the Quickening
was sweet hell, because, in some distant corner of his mind, he knew where
it came from, knew the cost it came with. Zarach didn't think about his
life. He heard his own heart beating, louder even than the thunder thumping
that filled the cave. And he was willing to take it all to stop that burning
craving in his soul.
Zarach knew, with a tiny part of what was left of his consciousness that
those things were happening. But the pain overwhelmed the rest of him.
Then the blackness arrived. Creeping, thick blackness, like none he had
experienced before, slowly filling his awareness. He wanted to get away from
it, but it was inside his head. The touch of the blackness then became the
touch of liquid fire that seeped through his pores and overwhelmed his soul,
stripping away all that he was, all that he would be, and leaving in their
places an acute, never-ending loneliness that filled him up until he could
hold no more as he dropped on the ground.
Suddenly he felt himself being lifted through the air, so he let go. It was
like floating on a fast whirlwind. He spread his arms and legs. Above him,
the Dark Quickening was coming fast. The dark cloud of energy had extended
halfway into the cave.
All over his entire body, Zarach's wounds reopened, and his bleeding started
to get much worse.
Zarach was raging, burning. He was lost in that eternal moment. He felt just
pain. He felt his mouth as dry as the desert. He tasted the dust in the wind
swirling around him, rubbing his skin. He felt the lightning. The rays spoke
to him as they burned his soul. Mother was there with him. Now She Who
Belonged to the Night was part of the Son of the Endless Night. Maybe she
would control him-no, anything but that! Zarach felt his skin was fire and
smoking.
Arcs of blue lightning lit through Zarach's hands, fusing his fingers
together. A long blue arc danced from his hand and into his eyes, and his
vision was filled with the killings of Lilitu. He saw the illumination,
attaching him to the dead Goddess. The heat expanded. He leaned back his
head and felt the saliva in his mouth spark with lightning. He felt Lilitu's
true power.
The blackness seemed to swim, and then it began taking on form, taking on
shapes. Zarach heard a baby-cry. His unborn son cursed him from the other
world.
He jerked as one more massive jolt of pain shot through his mind. Like a
distant object, he could see the light coming in the now-open door of his
soul. But the light wasn't enough to hold back the darkness. The shakes hit
him again, making his blood boil like a volcano blossoming with lava-heat.
Then the agony left Zarach's body. Extreme bright and pain, and then
nothing. He fell forward on the ground. Exhaustion etched every line of his
body. He took a deep, shuddering breath, and then stopped as his mind flew
into oblivion. The Dark Quickening had completely taken him before he hit
the ground.
========
Inside the cave, the aftermath was unavoidable. Lilitu's cavern shook with
earthquake-level vibrations. The tremors rocking the cave overruled any
intention.
Aylon rushed into the chamber.
The first things he saw in the middle of the pandemonium were the halves of
Lilitu's corpse and her blood and guts littering through the cavern's
ground, a dire display of Zarach's capabilities.
Even in the chaos, Aylon smiled. He had fulfilled his word. He had seen
Lilitu's death. Then his gaze scanned the area. Beneath the dust, he found
Zarach.
A lethal rain of stalactites invaded the surroundings. The whole place was
collapsing. Aylon ran across the field of deadly falling stalactites,
running like a madman for his brother. He reached Zarach's inert body, threw
him onto his back, and left the place, out the same way back through the
gateway, up the sandy staircase and into the dark tunnels of the cave
itself.
Around him, everything was chaos. The rumbling increased in intensity. In
the entranceway, he found his way up through a hole in the floor, only to
discover himself in a virtual hurricane-black vapor. Massive amounts of
water were being drawn through every archway and down into a huge sucking
hole in the middle of the chamber, a whirlpool of wind and water.
Plastering himself behind a rocky archway, which blocked him from getting
pelted by flying debris, Aylon watched the howling wind, his clothing
whipping in the storm. It seemed the gates of hell were opened in front him.
Maybe there was no way out of there. No, he corrected himself, there was
always a way, although it might not be good, or easy. He looked around
desperately, spotting something. He went up through the stairway inside the
arch.
Though the wailing wind echoed up the stairway, no flying black vapor
followed him. About midway to the top, a narrow fissure in the stonewall
seemed oblivious to the siphoning effect, and allowed Aylon to peer out at
what the destruction of Lilitu had wrought.
The entire island was being swallowed up, the sea-palm trees, brush, bushes,
the earth itself, and the Hunters' corpses. It was as if the materials of
the island were squirming, protesting, hissing, swimming through the flying
dirt and debris. The cave, already alive with tremors, began to shake
violently. Remembering that hungry whirlpool-like hole inside, Aylon
realized that he had to move, and move fast.
Aylon ran up the stairs once more. The stairway opened into a small, open
landing near the tip of the mountain, but a press of jungle foliage, sucked
up against the side of the heap, blocking his way, kept him from knowing how
high up he might still be, and prevented him from leaping to safety. The
rocks and fronds slapped at him, insultingly, as the wind drew the jungle
itself into the ravenous waterless vortex.
He was trapped, unable to save Zarach and himself. He saw no way out. None.
After all of this... after braving so much... enduring so much... triumphing
over so much...
There was always a way, he remembered. But he didn't have to think of one,
because the noise of the turbines came out from above. He whirled to see
Heru-sa-aset's YF-25 Serpentarius-VI rising over the peak, just behind him.
The combat jet deployed a ramp, and Aylon watched Methos extending him an
arm. "Hurry up! This whole island wants to suck us down!"
Aylon hoisted Zarach over the side of the access ramp. Then he jumped too.
Instants later, as the aircraft took height, the island sank into the ocean,
never to return.
Aboard the YF-25 Serpentarius-VI cockpit, Heru-sa-aset saw the moment when
the island disappeared. He glanced a quick eye over his shoulders, and saw
the care Methos manifested when he placed Zarach in his seat. The Egyptian
Prince could not hear the words Aylon said to Methos; but he knew-and
shared-the sentiment. Zarach was obviously badly wounded. It was the Son of
the Endless Night himself, then, who had killed Lilitu. May the Gods help
him.
========