The Dawn Gods War.
The Dawn Gods War.
Volume Two: Dance Of The Damned
Forward;
“All things have a beginning. All things have an ending. In between exists everything. While an obvious statement, the consequences, choices, and perception of all exists within the middle.
It is the filling that holds purpose and meaning in the great cosmic pierogi of the universe.
Och, pierogi, paistig, pastie, empanada or the eternal burrito, call it what you will. It all means the same thing.”
Llew
Floating, drifting on the various up drafts, they dominated the washed out blue of the skies.
The wide shallow sea lay still, without a ripple. A mirror laid out stretching beyond the horizon. Seen from the distance it was as if hundreds of explosively colored butterflies floated above a great mirror.
These were not butterflies.
These were adult Draeg, it was the season of mating.
The rainbow colored draeg danced, sang, drifting like so many flowers caught in a breeze.
The sea bottom writhed In a kaleidoscopic vision.
Rainbow hued nymphs , excited by the pheromones from the mating frenzy above the sea, moved in a fractal chaos.
The pheromones triggered internal hormonal response , which in turn resulted in the eel like nymphs to enter a dormant phase. Their skin hardening , transforming into cocoons, for their transformation into full draconic form.
In one complete Seasonal cycle, three seasonal years on Gorias, One half a seasonal cycle on Home.
The sea shores will be covered in New born Draeg, about the size of a house cat, drying their new wings in the constant shore breeze. The wings , being translucent, casting prismatic rainbow shadows all about them.
The mirror seas, the deep green of the surface moss that covered most of Falias, the flight of Grown Draeg , that cavorted while proving a protection for their young, casting more prismatic rainbow shadows.
A cacophony of colors.
A symphony of light.
Aos Sidhe, watched from afar.
The scene , majestic, and nearly overwhelming.
No, not nearly. Completely overwhelming.
Not as overwhelming however, as the choosing, which was yet to come.
After the young Draeg wings had dried and rudimentary flight accomplished, the Adult Draeg would select Aos Sidhe, and carry them to the choosing.
Young Draeg would seek their chosen. The Aos Sidhe that resonated with the Draeg on a quantum level, the pair quantum entangled.
The Choosing, is a bond for life .
A union on Physical, Psychological and Quantum-Spiritual/Psychic levels.
Minds, thoughts, emotions shared in the Choosing.
The Choosing, is a free association.
One of the greater joys of being Aos Sidhe.
Falias was the smallest of the Four worlds. Rich, green, wet, with a ring of Moonlets, gracing the night skies.
The gravity was nearly half that of Murias, home world. Those Aos Sidhe of Falias enjoyed full advantage. Their vestigial wings, worked quite well for Flight through the skies of Falias.
It was a time of exuberant existence.
The People, reigned over The four Worlds , and a handful of planetoids, moons in orbit around the Two largest gas giant planets.
Gorias, the closest to the Sun,
Finias the third planet, A blue and white beauty.
With three moons.
Falias, the Fourth planet with her ring of moonlets,
And The crown jewel of the System, Murias, the Fifth planet. Homeworld, of the Aos Sidhe, home of the creators.
The year of Murias, one complete cycle of seasons was twice the length of those on Falias, four times that of Finias.
One Year of Murias, equals two years of Falias, and Four years of Finias, and six years of Gorias.
On Home, the only calendar observed was that of Home.
Off world, the seasonal year of Falias became the standard. Falias being the First world settled and transformed.
Dierdre, raven haired, Sapphire eyes, blood red lips, mistress of Falias, Lady to Fionn, PenDraeg, Lord of Falias. Deirdre enjoyed sailing the shallow seas of her home. The high prowed narrow Talon ships could cruise at high speeds. Wing like sails and hydroplaning water wings, lifted the swift craft a good length of stride above the still waters.
With no central lunar mass to cause them, the seas of Falias knew no tides.
The mirror seas did know raging storms that could blow in, and sweep across the seas like wildfires. Wildfires of lightning, thunder, water spouts, croisc Anfa( twisted storms), and driving rain.
It was sailing those storms that brought Deirdre her greatest joys,
Outside of the arms of her beloved at any rate.
Oh, but making love in the midst of those storms. That, yes, that was perfection manifest.
Out of control passions cradled in, excited by the madness of storms.
That let one know that they were fully alive.
Decadent, delicious, Deirdre. Knew she was alive.
She relished in her experience.
Deirdre, Daughter of Danu-Isis,
Daughter of the Dagda-Osiris
Was restless.
Impatient.
These formal ceremonial presentations were such a nuisance.
Still well under a Falian century, Deirdre held all of the unbridled energies and need to move, to do, to be, that youth encompasses.
However her presence was required.
Her newborn sister was being presented formally before the Court today.
Cathbadua,
The youngest of the Dynasty of Don.
Princess , Duchess, and Baroness, Cathbadua. Princess of Falias, Baroness of Gorias, Duchess of Finias.
For Her part, baby Catha slept and farted throughout the boring procedure.
Deirdre envied her little sister.
The Court Ooo’d and Ahhh’d and Coo’d as required
Once Catha , while being held up before the Creators for their approval. Grunted, and farted loudly.
Deirdre couldn’t help but to laugh out loud. As did her Father Dagda-Osiris. Which earned hard looks from Mom, though even the Queens lips twitched in amusement.
Sighing the Queen was heard to murmur, ” Only the mad, the ancient elders, and newborns are free to voice their true thoughts...”
The court struggled, divided
Half fighting not to laugh in agreement.
Half mortified by the irreverence.
Soon enough, required rites, respects and oaths were finished.
The newborn Cathbadua safely tucked into her nursery. The formal gathering degenerated into joyful chaos.
The morrow would see to a choosing.
The court had been informed by various Draeg that Deirdre was being called for choosing.
The Aos Sidhe, flew upon Dragon ships, on the Seas, flew upon Dragons in the Skies, flew upon their own wings upon the winds.
It was damnably difficult to discern, who served whom, the Draeg or Aos Sidhe. The two species so intertwined as to live almost as one species.
Both , Clearly served the Creators of Murias without question.
The Draeg were the only other intelligent life within the Solar system, Not created by the Murians.
They evolved on the fourth planet independent of Murias.
By the time the first interplanetary probes, carrying Aos Sidhe arrived at Falias, the Draeg had developed, and for eons had dwelt between the worlds.
Throughout their existence, No One knows what the natural lifespan of the Draeg is.
The Draeg never stop growing. Never.
The bigger the Dragon, the older the Dragon.
Beginning at about the size of a house cat,
They grow immensely.
Once they become too large for a planetary existence, they move on into the immensity between worlds.
While oxygen breathers, the Biochemistry of the Draeg, does not require an atmosphere.
The same chemical process that allows them to exude fire, even in a vacuum, produces the oxygen they need.
So long as they have a food source, they live and grow.
Planet side, Draeg eat, whatever they choose. Disputing the desire of Draeg never ended well. Those foolish enough to do so usually became a snack.
Organic sources did tend to provide more than sufficient sources.
Off world, the Draeg, eat Comets, specifically, the Ice compounds , often following comets in their orbits.
Many Adult Draeg, reside in the extensive Oort clouds. A nutrient rich food supply.
While between worlds, the Draeg are limited in mobility. Unable to generate constant thrust, they rely upon gravity, and solar winds.
The Draeg had been aware of Murias, long before the Murians even suspected their existence.
First contact caught only the Murians by surprise.
The Draeg , in the mature state are four limbed. Fresh hatched from the egg, a Draeg nymph, resembles a small oarfish in appearance. After emerging from their cocoon, they appear as a Four limbed, butterfly winged, moving kaleidoscope.
The true hands, those two limbs closest to their head , held four clawed “fingers” between two clawed opposable ” Thumbs”.
The rear feet held five claws, four toes and an opposable thumb claw.
This made them incredibly adept at manipulation of objects.
Their translucent wings, were Photo reactive. Reacting to light and electro magnetic fields. The photo electric effect generates electric currents.
Their scales responded to external stress, by producing electric charge. They also provided for chameleon like color shifting camouflage. To strike a Drag physically, resulted in a electric discharge, grounding through whatever ever impacted the Draeg.
To hit a draeg was to be subject to being struck down by a proportional electric charge
The Draeg could utilize these sources of energy.
To communicate the Draeg incorporated a complex structure. Consisting of visual signals, via wing and scale colors. High frequency radio waves, and extreme low frequency radio waves. The Draeg spoke among themselves, mind to mind, via Radiowaves.
Five hundred thousand cycles, brought about selective adaptation, evolution, of Draeg and AOS SIDHE.
The creators of Murias incorporated elements of Draeg DNA, into the AOS Sidhe.
This created a bond.
An ability for Draeg and AOS Sidhe, to communicate with each other without spoken words. A communication on a quantum level combined with pure thought. Aos Sidhe and Draeg, quantum entangled.
This relationship, molded the two peoples into effectively one.
Before the war, brought by the Fomorii,
There was no war. No violence, no deceptions, there was only, life and the experience of life.
The creators of Murias, experienced the solar system vicariously through the AOS Sidhe.
Then, the Fomorii, tried to destroy Finias.
Nearly successfully.
When the shock wore off the Draeg and Aos Sidhe were, for the first time ever in existence, enraged.
Gorias was laid waste.
Hundreds of thousands of Draeg , with AOS Sidhe companions , descended upon Gorias. The Fomorii had no defense. They could only watch as the Draeg, descended along the orbital plane.
When the Draeg, breathe fire, it is spectacular.
First, comes the blast of explosive gasses , thermites in gas and liquid form. This is ignited by a small electric discharge. Creating a stream of burning, charged plasma. When this stream of burning plasma grounds, a lightning bolt discharges along the stream.
The effect such a weapon has is impressive.
Burning, hotter than the sun, combined with an average 500,000 volt, 500,000 amp discharge, whatever is struck is destroyed.
Enough Draeg breathing fire can ignite a planets atmosphere.
That is what happened to Gorias.
Everything , was incinerated. Right down into the planetary crust.
Nothing survived on Gorias. The atmosphere transformed into clouds of acid.
Nothing, not one nano molecule survived upon Gorias.
The AOS Sidhe and the Draeg thought the war was over.
They were wrong.
The war had only began.
Fomorii had survived, on the planetoid moons around the gas giants.
The Demon of war had been awakened.
The Demon , has an unending appetite for death and destruction.
The response of the Fomorii left Murias a cloud of rubble orbiting the sun.
The moons of the gas giants were incinerated.
Back and forth.
Tit for tat.
The Aos Sidhe transformed into madness.
The Fomorii learned fear.
The demons of war were well fed.
The Dawn Gods War
The Death of Dragons holds the fate of Worlds.
The First Apocalypse:
The world of Gorias,
Was uninhabitable by Anything other than Fomorii constructs.
Gorias had become the factory world, of the System.
Abundant resources,
Highly reactive super thick atmosphere,
Nothing else, even on a strictly biochemical amino acid structure existed there.
Only purely chemical reactions. No biochemical systems existed.
No forms of life, either organically molecular or synthetic chemical existed prior to the seeding of nanobot clouds.
The Fomorii transformed the second planet into their own image some say.
Some say, the Fomorii adapted to and adopted the chaos, as their Identity.
Which is true, matters not because both are true.
The Fomorii were left alone, with only their preprogrammed identity to guide them. For eons.
Therein lies the root of the conflict.
Fomorii, fully aware of the rest of the system,
Relegated to, for lack of a better description, hell.
I would surmise, that resentment and envy played into the madness.
Revolt being inevitable.
No matter the power, knowledge or capabilities,
Those that exist within spacetime, can not ever be, Gods.
Only GOD, the primal cause, first observer, that exists outside of spacetime is GOD.
Everything within is a creation, a universe ofr Ceations, problematic though they may be.
Regardless of ego, awareness, or delusion,
Everything within spacetime is a creation.
ONLY GOD, the creator that is, outside of spacetime, is or can be a GOD.
It is profound stupidity to think otherwise.
That didn’t stop the creations from self serving arrogance and delusions of grandeur, from trying to pretend otherwise.
Pride goeth before the fall.
Pride leads the way to the fall.
Gravity works.
Everything within spacetime falls.
EVERY THING.
The apocalypse, was inevitable.
We exist in a universe, in process of falling.
We Are Fallen.
Everything within spacetime,
Exists in a macabre dance with damnation.
We damn ourselves.
We live in a dance of the Damned.
Entropy is fact.
GOD like, does not translate into being GOD.
It means, like, as if, similar,
None of which are true in any of the aspects.
The Creators , of Murias could not leave their world.
They fabricated beings that could. Drones so to speak.
The creators forgot that they themselves were, creations.
Which led to hubris, delusion, and, destruction.
GOD did not curse them. GOD merely watched them curse themselves.
And so,
The Fomorii ,
Followed the path of their creators.
When confronted with reality, the Fomorii sought to impose their will, their delusion, of supremacy.
The first EVER war began.
A war still raging till this day. A war that encompassed an entire Star system.
A million years of War.
That had even spread out between the stars.
To get at the Creators, the Fomorii, had to remove their only opponents, the Aos Sidhe.
That was no mean feat.
Which was why the Fomorii first, struck Murias. Raining point singularities and negative matter bombs until murias shattered.
The Aos Sidhe with the Draeg, retaliated by utterly destroying Gorias.
Tit for tat.
So it began.
Millennia of skirmishes.
Choices.
Our choices define us.
Our choices create the reality of our experience.
Choices , it all boils down to Choice.
Who do you choose to be? What type of person do you choose to be?
Who are the friends, you choose?
Who are the enemies you choose?
What are the values, you choose?
The Mirror sea, mirrored the stars.
It was psychedelic. If not for a functional inner ear, Deirdre would have been unable to tell up from down. The cat sized bundle in her lap wiggled. Soft scales moved, lifting slightly, color shifting as they moved. Colors rippled and moved, much like the tufted grain heads of rye grass swaying in a breeze.
Avagddu, Nights Wing.
Learning that much , the young Draeg’s name had been labor intensive. Idly, Deirdre traced finger tips along the folded wings.
Strange that they felt , almost exactly like her own in texture. The softest, fluffiest velvet she could imagine. Where Deirdres vestigial wings were of a singular color.
The Draeg wings were kaleidoscopic, constantly shifting patterns and color.
In Time, the entanglement would be learned. Draeg and AOS Sidhe, mapping each other’s minds, emotions, selves. There could be no instruction manual in doing this. No more than a manual would help a new born child learn to crawl, walk, run, speak, listen, see.
Time for intricate mind merging.
The process would produce an entirely new entity. Split between Draeg and AOS Sidhe. A merged being, Deirdre/Avagddu, Avagddu/Deirdre.
Deirdre in essence, entered into another childhood. A childhood shared in, with, Avaggddu. Together, they learned to fly. To listen to the soul storm that all Draeg shared. To forge their bond, their union of mind, of hearts.
Years passed as if in a dream.
Things happened outside of the Draeg creche of the mirror sea. Faraway things. War, rumors of war. No one quite knew what to make of war.
The initial response to the treacherous Fomorii had been a hive mind of madness and fury. Worlds had ceased. All of that was still incomprehensible.
Deirdre with Avagddu had spent those years growing together. Untouched by the outside world. Unconcerned, until the outside world of horrors had come, uninvited, to introduce hell.
***†††***†††***†††***
The fall along the orbital plane took decades. The craft, an adapted Moonlet, exuded No outward signs of radiation, propulsion, or presence of technology whatsoever. This was crucial to the mission. A covert insertion, followed by devastating strikes on the inner system realm of Aos Sidhe.
Launched from the oort cloud, the orbit the craft followed had taken a century already.
Still, the craft had yet to cross the still forming Asteroid belt. Rail guns launched drones with Chemical rockets. The drones moved considerably faster, the chemical rockets only to be used for orbital maneuver and adjustments. The Aos Sidhe could easily detect any form of electromagnetic radiation. Therefore, more primitive systems were employed. The Fomorii could afford to be patient. The Drones passively detected, and recorded all EM transmissions detected, relaying the data collected via quantum entangled com systems. Slowly the Fomorii evaluated and developed their plans. There was a certain sense of satisfaction in phase one, set to commence within the near future. Using the debris from the destroyed home world as weapons seemed almost poetic. Secrecy was paramount. The Aos Sidhe must not have any suspicion or all would fail.
‡****†††****‡
Laughter, is there a more joyous sound? Aside from your name on the lips of your lover at the peak of passion, no there is not.
When that laughter is over the devastation of a world. Accompanied by tears, and the screams and cries of the Damned and dying. I do believe that laughter is terrifying.
Deidre was a survivor so to speak.
Part of her had survived.
Avagddu had sheltered her body with his body. Physically, he had survived as well.
Mentally...
The Draeg did not share a hive mind. More of a sort of hive soul. Avagddu’s soul had become chaos, fury, fear, rage, pain, mostly his soul had become silent.
The silence is what brought the fear. Avagddu had never known such silence. Deirdre, had survived, however her mind had effectively shut down in shock. Their connection was scrambled. Avagddu could hear, her vocalized laughter. What broadcast from Deirdres mind was, something Avagddu could not comprehend.
The Mirror sea lay deceptively still. The flames and destruction reflected across the still surface were so violent that Avagddu expected storm waves to be crashing in response.
There was only the stillness that mirrored the hellscape of mountain peaks. Skies burning as pieces of the moonlets rained down from orbit. Somewhere, far away on the far side of the world a massive eruption poured hot gases and magma out. The clouds from that nightmare framed the horizon.
Avagddu, too wounded and weak to take flight could do nothing. He studied Deirdre. Her body trembled. She continued laughing. With no other ideas of action, Avagddu pulled Deirdre close to keep her warm and curled about her sheltering her with his body.
Time passed. At some point, Deirdre, slept, as did Avagddu. As usual, their dreams merged. They Flew free. Sky dancing. Swooping low close over the mirror sea. Close enough that the aircraft of their passing left rippling wakes on the smooth waters.
Deirdre leapt to consciousness. The pain was. It was , shocking. Pain so intense that it effectively stunned her into a distant numbness. Avagddu stirred.
Deirdre stumbled to the waters edge. She examined herself. Arms scarred, burnt, deformed. Looking at her reflection on the still waters, She realized that the source of the searing pains on her back, marked the vacant place her vestigial wings had been.
Parts of her were hideously scarred. Her arms and hands now resembled talons more than hands. Still, Deirdre was alive. Avagddu was alive.
Where there was life, there could be, vengeance.
Together Deirdre with Avagddu became, vengeance.
The terror on nights wings.
The fury and madness of rage manifest. The Fomorii would pay.
Those survivors of the attack on Falias. While stunned, nevertheless responded diligently. The damage was beyond repair. Falias was not a dying world. Falias was a corpse rapidly decomposing.
An negative matter detonation had created a crater, the bottom of which lay in the planetary magma. Shock waves had caused the planet to ring much like a bell. Magma poured out. The core, had ceased spinning. The magnetic field collapsed. The incessant solar winds began stripping away the atmosphere.
Evacuation was the only option for the survivors. There was now only one inhabitable world. The blue and white third planet.
Getting there would be interesting. The Aos Sidhe had no idea if the Fomorii awaited them in interplanetary space. That didn’t matter. There was no other option.
The belt of moonlets continued to fall, hammering the surface. The atmosphere thinning. Only a few Draeg had survived on Falias. Eight in ten of the Aos Sidhe were gone. Destroyed in negative matter blasts.
There were some few thousand in various off planet positions.
Still, the Aos Sidhe were facing near extinction.
The Fomorii were disappointed.
Their strike had failed to eradicate the Aos Sidhe. The planetoid base and drones, detected and destroyed. It would be ages again before the Fomorii could prosecute their war with any true effect.
Aos Sidhe, unimpeded by Fomorii, evacuated the ruin of Falias.
Fenias was their refuge, their new home.
The Aos Sidhe had been eternally changed. Betrayed. Nearly extinguished. Their gods, destroyed. Their delusion of godhood exposed the Aos Sidhe fell along the orbital plane to the third planet.
Clans , nations, gone.
Only tattered remnants. So much lost.
Rage, fury, became their new essence. Vengeance their new righteousness.
War their very being.
Chapter 3; The birth of Llew.
Originally 13 treasures, weapons honestly, had survived the destruction of Falias. Of those treasures only five remained.
The Grail, The Sword, The Spear, The Shield and The Helm.
The treasures were beyond the ability of the Aos Sidhe to recreate. Sentient quantum artificial intelligence nano technology required tools that the Aos Sidhe no longer possessed. Tools they could not reproduce.
Too many, eight of every ten Aos Sidhe had been lost in the War before the surviving remnant had become refugees on the third planet.
Of The few remaining Draeg, those that had not withdrawn to the Oort clouds after the destruction of Gorias, Murias, and Falias, only those that had bonded with Aos Sidhe stayed with the Aos Sidhe.
Among those were the few hundreds of nymph Draeg that had been saved and brought to Fenias, the third planet.
Prydwen, the moonlet that the refugees had used to bring the fragments of Aos Sidhe and Draeg survivors and technology whirled in an eccentric spiraling orbit of Fenias and the large single moon of the third planet.
The last remaining city of the Aos Sidhe encompassed an island. Ring within rings, a maze of walled canals encircled the island. At the center lay the hall of champions.
Peak roofed, pagoda like, or rather more a massive Norse Stave Church built of stone with black basalt shingled roofs.
Within the highest point lay the armory.
The last repository of ancient AOS SIDHE Technology. Weapons the Aos Sidhe could no longer construct. Terrible creations of power.
Chief among them , The Sword and The Spear. Dubbed the God slayers.
Made from lost, forgotten nanite technology. Each nanite an individual artificial intelligence. Molecular level quantum computers.
The blade of the sword, could create heat of such intensity that the air around it ignited into burning charged plasma. The cutting edge, one atom thick. Sharper than monomolecular blades. The composite alloy an amalgam of rare earths and metals from throughout the Solar system.
The spear, made of the same materials as the sword. Though , capable of flight. An AI missile in effect, when cast at targets. It never missed, howling as it flew true.
These were the weapons of the Champion of the Aos Sidhe.
The weapons chose the wielder. Declared Champion, The Pendragon, the chief of Dragons, the devouring fury.
To be chosen was to be changed forever.
The nanites would bond with the chosen, transforming the chosen on a molecular level.
To the Hall of Champions, to the Sword and Spear Nodens returned as he had been called. Finally understanding , answering the call.
So, Nodens became Llew
The courtiers that were witnessed were under whelmed. Nothing dramatic occurred when Llew took up the God slayers.
Some changes take time.
Combining with and rewriting AOS SIDHE triple strand genetic molecular core is complicated. These changes, would be passed on, to all descendants of the Champion.
Eons would pass before Setanta, Llews only child, would be born. Those changes bred truly. They were the real reason Setanta became called, The Hound.
Even so.
The long fall continued. War and death had become the essence of the Aos Sidhe.
To an extent, the Fomorii had successfully destroyed the Aos Sidhe.
Shattering the bond with the Draeg, twisting the peaceful beautiful fae, with their ethereal wings into the fallen champions of destruction.
Too bad the Fomorii had not learned to not shit in their own beds.
They had created the destruction of all in their pride and envy.
The Dance of The Damned had been called.
The paying of the piper would transition eons.
The Birth Of Balor.
Set watched blankly as the scramjet came apart around him.
There comes a point that sheer non stop terror and horror leaves even a Fomorii ,
Numb is not quite right, stunned?
A state of permanent CPTSD trauma replay?
An inability to feel anything other than shock, terror and horror.
The sound of supersonic winds, the tearing metals, the sharp snap and cracks of synthetic composites, ceramics, flotsam and jetsom of what seconds before had been Sets rescue flight.
Through all of the chaos, Nothing could drown out the sounds ringing out, replaying in memories.
The triune fiend Set had inadvertently created, devouring his wife and daughter alive. The screams, the spasms, the popping of joints, snap of bones, the sounds of ripping flesh. His daughters voice crying out for him.
The Trinity of fury knew he was watching over the net system. They, it, made sure to hold tasty tidbits up for the sensors to record. While they laughed.
The evac team had discovered Set, in foetal position, gasping, fighting for breath between inarticulate moans and gibberish. The team bundled him up and moved out.
Taking Set to the surface and the waiting evac craft. They had a slim window of time before AOS SIDHE drone sensors detected them.
The underground facility had been a closely guarded secret for more than a thousand years. When first built, the desert, had been a lush savannah. Criss crossed with rivers and lakes. The center of the Fomorii Dominance. Now after more than a Millenia of war's desolation. No rivers, lakes, grasses remained. Only bare stone and sand. Harsh winds had scoured away the dried powder of the once richly fertile loam.
The ejection pod enclosed Set, as his acceleration couch tumbled freely amidst the scattering wreckage. In the fragments of seconds bits and pieces had struck his body. Wounding him severely. A leg and arm had been torn away by debris and the supersonic slipstream. Set, felt none of it. Not even the pain of those terrible injuries could compete with the hell in his mind. The guilt, the shame, the sense of being responsible. Set had watched the complete destruction of nine hundred scientists, technicians, friends, colleagues. Five Centuries of security personnel, fourteen hundred slaughtered. Torn apart by bare hands and savage teeth. The immense savagery seared into his mind that the Fomorii had been right to rebel against their creators. The AOS SIDHE were the personification of death and destruction, of chaos.
Some, now unknown number of eons before the Fomorii had been created by the AOS SIDHE. Created to be servants, assistants, amusement. Set remembered those days. One of the handful that could.
In the beginning, Set had been a technician assisting Aos Sidhe research and development. When the Fomorii on the second planet had begun the rebellion, successfully seizing control there. Set had been on the team designing, building, testing the Weapons of the Aos SIDHE.
Before the rebellion, there had been no war. No weapons.
The initial success of the Fomorii had been due to the fact that the Aos Sidhe, had no idea how to respond, what to do.
The Aos Sidhe learned very quickly though. They had, a million years before, evolved from apex Predators on the Fifth planet. Five hundred thousand years of peace took only one generation to unlearn.
Several Millenia of war ,
Left a Solar system that once held ten planets, reduced to nine. Four inhabitable worlds , reduced to
One. One world reduced to orbital rubble.
The war continued on, the one habitable world for eons more.
Set had remembered all of that. Had.
Between Psychological damage to his created quantum entangled nano tech networked system, and sheer physical damage from the evac scramjet being shot down at mach seven , and the effects of phased array Maser on his nanite structure.
What survived was no longer Set.
His only intact memories being those days trapped in the facility while the Morrigna raged.
Set , became, Balor, one eye, one legged, one armed, a Fomorii monster composed of terror, horror, and rage.
The war continued. Now , the AOS Sidhe had new champions, new leaders.
Llew of the lightning spear, and his radiant sword of light, Fragarach, the Retaliator.
With, the Morrigna,
Three Identical quantum linked quantum clones. Badbh, Macha, And Nemain, Terror, Rage, and Fury.
The human cattle, scuttled about, sheltering in caves, canyon, mountains, deep jungles, remote islands. Seeking desperately to find refuge from the destruction wreaked by this war of the gods. Several times the Fomorii nearly succeeded in wiping out the human cattle.
The results being, that the Fomorii became in myth, The Titans, the forces of destruction and death.
While the AOS SIDHE became, the Gods, saviors, protectors. Gods that demanded blood , in return for protection.
__________________________________________
__________________________________________
Dragons flew, leaving their fiery trails across the autumn skies. Catha knew, that they were not really dragons, that they were actually fragments left from a world killer that the Aos Sidhe had intercepted in the distant past. Long before she had been born.
True Dragons had once ruled the skies of the red planet. Once Aos Sidhe had ridden them, soaring in joyous exhilaration. Sadly that had been eons before her birth. Before the destruction of the sacred realm. The world's of wonder in the ages of glory. Before the deaths of worlds.
Catha often dreamed of the freedom of dragon flight. The closest she could find now was in wind riding. Flying with the wind driven body wings. Like, kites. Nearly as agile as birds, still limited by up drafts, wind and terrain which governed low altitude air flows.
The first Time Catha had seen Nodens, was on her fifteenth decalogue. Fifteen decades. Her coming out celebration, the formal introduction into Aos Sidhe society.
An Adolescent beauty to be sure.
Nodens, had been on the kings guard, part of an aerial insertion demonstration done in her honor. The guards had appeared, in the predawn skies as faint streaks of fire. Like, meteors they flew from low earth orbit.
Performing aerobatic maneuvers, leaving long shining trails of colorful plasma, interacting super sonic shock waves, complex artistic patterns as they flew, dancing in fire and the breaking dawn.
Catha was spellbound, it was spectacularly beautiful.
The team landed in the open central courtyard of the palace in ranked formation. Sweeping in, banking up suddenly and seeming to step lightly from the sky onto the ground.
The wing suits retracted into the glittering titanium ceramic armor the team wore. Twelve warriors stood, male and female, Their helms shaped as dragons.
The dragons Head and neck formed the nasal guard. The Body formed the bowl of the Helm, out stretched Claws formed cheek guards, the tail, segmented, flexible protected the neck. Out Stretched wings, swept up from the sides of the helm. The wings moved as the warriors moved giving the illusion of living dragons .
Swords were drawn in salute.
The Team knelt before Catha.
Her personal guard formally presented on her name day.
Oath was sworn, fealty made.
One by one the guards rose, approached Catha, knelt, laying sword at her feet swearing blood oath to her. Each guard cut their right hand, to bleed into the chalice Catha held. As she accepted their oath, Catha ritually tasted of their blood. Forming a bond, a knowing with each of her personal guard.
Nodens was the fourth to kneel and swear. Catha looked into his eyes and drew in a startled breath. Lightning swept sapphires blazed at her. Looking into her. When she took the ritual taste it was as if he marked her soul. As she knew him, he knew her.
Catha could not remember any of the other guards after that.
The rest of her name day existed only in her mind as the taste of Him, and the lightning fires of his eyes.
She knew him, Catha had dreamt him. Here had come her Dragon lord. It was an intensity forever etched into her soul, to forever shape her heart.
_________________________________________
Nodens, loved orbital inserts.
Falling, flying, it was an incredible rush of freedom and unadulterated joy. Stepping out of the hold in low earth orbit was, actually a bit terrifying the first time. Nodens had been unable to shit for a week afterwards.
The second time was worse.
Something happened on his third jump.
He knew what to expect, and that contrary to all his physical sensory input he was not going to die as an indistinct smear of burnt ash on the clouds or as a splash of unrecognizable ooze on the ground.
Nodens, enjoyed himself. By the time his feet grounded all he wanted was to jump again. He had found his purpose. The subsequent missions, strikes by the Kings Fianna against high value Fomorii targets was another purpose. The struggle between AOS Sidhe and the Fomorii was not a struggle of ideologies, it was the fight between life, and death.
Not a battle between good and evil, neither side could be in truth called either. Composed of a composite of both good and evil.
It was more a struggle between the messy chaos of life and the death, inherent in perfect order. Chaos brought both life and death. Pure order brought only, death. Nothing, stillness. Non existence.
The Aos Sidhe are chaos embodied.
The Fomorii are implacable death.
Of the two, it may be argued that the Fomorii, were the embodiment of evil. Because the Fomorii hated everything about their creators, the Aos Sidhe.
The Fomorii were especially jealous and hated anything created by the Aos Sidhe, including themselves.
That was the evil that Nodens had pledged himself to oppose and destroy. There could never be a peace between the Aos Sidhe and Fomorii. There could only be war. Until only one remained.
Thus, for ten decades, Nodens had found his purpose.
So he had reasoned. Until the day he had leapt out into the black of space and flew in plasma flames to earth, to kneel before, wonder. Red gold hair, Emerald flamed eyes, lips that cried out to be tasted, a smile of terrible promise. Her touch sent lightning through him. He desperately tried to drink her essence through the vision of her before him.
Nodens could remember nothing of the ceremony that day. Her eyes and smile would mark him, haunting him through the ages. That He had had the same effect on her, was obvious. Anyone watching when they met, could clearly see the interplay of their auras, their life's flames intertwining, dancing together. When Anam Croi met, it was plain for all to see.
Isis, noted the interchange. Osiris watched on , one eyebrow raised, considering. This one would have to be watched indeed!
The King and Queen exchanged looks. "Well, at least he is capable. No weak ones survive the training and becoming of the Fianna" Osiris murmured to his amused wife. " Yes, he may well be strong enough." Isis replied.
Unspoken was the knowledge that this pairing would have to be watched closely. Both young, powerful, capable, impetuous, self assured. Yes, parents nightmares manifest. Osiris laughed. " She was never going to be easy was she love."
Isis sighed in loving resignation, " She is our daughter after all.
_________________________________________
Badbh studied the kneeling man before her.
Memories of the first time seeing him flashed between her and Macha and Nemain. While they felt the reactions of young Catha, for the first time, Badbh was observing that this, Llew as he had named himself, burned even brighter than Nodens had. Something moved within her. Something began to smolder , then, burst into flame.
Macha and Nemain staggered as if struck. Then moved forward, the trio encircled the kneeling Llew. They reached out , collectively lifting him to his feet. " Do not kneel before us. We kneel to no one, to nothing. Let us finish the work. Let us end this. "
Smiling the four walked out of the hall of champions. The watching courtiers watched. A new thing had arose.
Debate began about how , who, the rituals,
It had been announced, before the taking, that the princess heir, Cathbadua, and Nodens were betrothed. That in time They would be King and Queen of the Aos Sidhe.
Now, Osiris and Isis were gone, destroyed by Fomorii treachery. Cathbadua had been,
transformed into the Morrigna. Nodens had become Llew.
A new era of uncertainty lay before them.
