Amidst the great battle of the final stand for New York...Ray recently-defeating his nemesis Long Tooth with the skin of his newly-forming snake fangs...then silencing the deathly wail of Ahura. He fought on his elite team known as the Shakari. When he heard a woman yelling a distort taunt "I may pass to the next world...but not without avenging you". Ray ordered the Shakari to follow his lead as he swung his Pendulum arms in a whirlwind, slicing apart the thick onslaught of specters. He broke through the last remaining few specters between him and the screams of pain now coming from the woman.
She was a Jadian, down on one knee with two fallen comrades at her side and a specter on her back clawing at her throat-- another sneering into her stern and seemingly helpless face. She closed her eyes and whispered something in Chinese and spikes shot out of her skin into the taunting specter's face and another into the throat of the specter on her back. Ray yelled to her, "Help is here!" The wounded specter-bodies still thrashing at her already-bloodied body. Ray flew at the specters, swinging precisely with each arm, throwing the specters away from her. She collapsed to the ground face first and lifeless. Ray swung his pendulum arms circularly around, fending off the newly-coming specters fight to get at her fallen body.
The Shakari caught up with Ray and expanded the defensive circle around them. Ray Bent down and lifted her up, now noticing how beautiful this woman was. She opened her eyes for a moment. As a last amount of strength, she gasped though her torn throat "sserr.pent..ine Roo...se....I ...foun..d you." Then fell completely limp and lifeless. Ray's mind raced trying to think of what he could do to save her with his pathos being completely spent and her slipping into oblivion. His heart raced and pulled into his soul, pulling at passions...The serpents that earlier grew from Ray's skin stretched upward and hissed as if in pain. Ray felt pathos raise a little at his desperation to help this valiant beautiful woman dying in his arms.
Immediately he moliated her wounds and healed some of the lethal damage she had taken. She released a scream out and then jolted her upper body up and looked to both sides of her in shock from where she had just been. "Its so cold..." she said, and wrapped her around his shoulders and laid her head on his chest. Ray was quite taken back from this...he had never pulled pathos from himself like this, nor had such a thank you as this. Instinctively he put his arms around her, and the snakes coiled around her, as well. Ray whispered back " When I have the strength I will help restore you more." She let out a small little laugh..."Yes my Serpentine Rose...I'm sure you will."
Ray-- still with his arms around her, questioning why he is stopped in the middle of most consequential battle of his life...but yet not wanting to let go of the woman he just fought to save-- whispered to her, "Why do you call me that? I'm only a Centurion."
Then she reached up grabbed his chin and pointed his face directly at hers and looked into his eyes and said "No...Ray...a centurion is what they called you. I have seen you many times and felt your soul."
Ray, now intimitadated that she knew his name and claims such, asked, "Who are you?! What makes you think you know me!"
She moved her hand to place a finger on his lips... "Shh...My Serpentine Savior...I am a outlet of fate...It speaks to me and has shown me more than you can yet know."
Ray asked, "Who are..."
She interrupted, "Yin Lung...and I owe you a life debt." She released her arms from around him and said, "Your men need you."
Then suddenly a whelp came from one of the men as he was struck by the now-winning specters. Ray let go of her, not knowing even really why he was holding her to begin with, and smiled "Yes...this conversation will wait...Yin." Then he leaped to his feet and ran to the aid of team.
"Good to have you back in action, commander, I was about to yell for you..." One of the men said.
"We have to pull back," Ray commanded, slicing the frenzy of spectors. "We will rejoin the team, we can't last forever out here. Shakari! Pull back to the main team!" Yin knelt over one of her fallen comrades performing rite of some sort. "Yin! There is no time! Were pulling back!" Ray called to her, and reached down and grabbed her, pulling her away.
She quickly grasped the man's Ivory Nodiche as she was being pulled away. "He was good friend to me...he died trying to hold them back that I might flee. I stayed with him...I ripped them off of him even when he had fallen. Till they swarmed on me."
"You're a brave woman," Ray commented.
Yin then sliced through four specters in front of them with the Nodiche then leaned her head back Ray's direction and said, "I knew you come...it was only a matter of time."
Ray smirked and said, "You're quite good with that sword. You trust too much in fate-- when I got to you I had no way to heal you."
"Then how did you?" Yin asked.
"I don't know how to explain it...but I found a way...it was like...I pulled a part of me out of the darkness and put it into you." Ray tried to explain.
Yin gave him an odd look and said "Ray, you have yet to learn your heart...you only feel...a good step this was...but an ascension awaits you my Serptine Rose...I am here to guide you."
Ray laughed, "Yin I think you've mistaken me for 'Yang'. I was chosen by the Serpent of Clay, yes. I am becoming sssomething, yess. (Noticed his tongue has forked and skin snakes are now coiled around his individual body parts) But, look I'm not your rose..."
"Raymond...you can't know...but you will...I will give your life back...It will be up to you...if you choose to live it." Yin said.
Ray pulled back from the forward attack and lets his second in command take the lead. "You act like know me so well...like you care about me or like I care about you...WTF!"
"I have something I have to tell you...we have to seek shelter first." Yin sais.
"Our guest of honor, is requesting a room! Lets make it happen! Shop on left 30 paces!" Ray shouted to his men. They make it to the shop and the Shakari secures the building. "Ok, miss Yin, every moment is another life-- lets cut to the chase. If there is something I need to know, now's the time."
Yin walked up to him slapped him in the face, and grabbed him by the sides of his head, starting to kiss him. Ray felt her tongue push into his mouth and caress his now-forked tongue. Lost in the moment and confused, but fulfilled, he kissed her back.
Yin pulled back, a tear in her eye..."I have known you since before you were born...I have felt so many of events in your life and your time here. I been the observer of your heart for hundreds of years. I have waited for you like a word waiting to be spoken."
Ray felt a tear come from his eye..."I...I...don't know..."
"Shhh, you don't have to know...not for moment...let this moment be what is and words can't wait a moment longer." Yin Leans forward and kisses Ray. Ray kisses back for the first time that he can remember out of passion...It feels so alien to him...like when he pulled strength out of the darkness to save Yin. "Yin Lung," he thought...
"How can this all be true...Why now...in middle of what could be the end...so sudden and unexpected could this be a scheme to confuse and distract me from helping New York...the Specters ...the Amenti...The Stygians...Markova...wait...the Jadien Emperor...LOL OMG you pathetic fool!" Ray's Shadow said.
Ray suddenly recoiled. "You...you work for the Jadian Emperor? He sent you here, didn't he?"
"Of course..." Yin said, wrapping her arms around him. "He sent me here to assess the hierarchy's ability to fight Markova...Then saw a part of you which I know when you were in Jade. He foresaw you will join Markova...He has ordered me to kill you before this happens....I tried to fight his will-- I couldn't."
Ray pulled away from her in an instant, slipping down and out of her arms and away to the wall.
Yin collapsed to the ground and yelled, "Stop, damn you...Stop...I don't tell you this because my will is be your assassin, it's because I love you...and am willing to accept your honorable judgment. But you must hear me out first..."
Ray is stutter-bound...words that he always dreamed of hearing...I love you...but at the same time she is forced to kill him..."Go on...then tell me Yin..."
"The Emperor has forced a mind control over me that I will stop you from joining Markova...to destroy your soul. The emperor may be able to force his will upon me but I have shielded my mind from him for countless years. He came to me today forced your death to me..." I knew this would happen and I knew what it meant...my visions are coming to light...It was when the Serpentine Rose was plucked from its garden...separated from his love his flower would bud. To rely only on his thorns and serpent nature. Then that you would bring me back from oblivion's grasp."
"She's lying! She was sent to lure you to your death...she is just playing you the love-seeking fool...SHE HAS THE WRONG YANG! KILL her...KILL her!" Ray's Shadows cried. "Two words...two words will end this nonsense and bring you back to the battle front to save your FRIENDS!"
Ray shuttered, "Friends...yes friends...I can't let the team fail because of me...you're right on that... maybe I can be her yang..." Ray thinks to his Shadow. "Shakara! I give you what may be my final order...Return to the Main team and take command under Cliodhna!" she shouted to his men.
"But commander..."
"No questions...Lives are being lost...Go! NOW!!!" Ray shouted.
The Shakara fought their way out the door with one of them yelling to the others, "lets give them a good distraction to give the commander a few moments."
"Yin, we must go to the roof and seal the entrance," Ray said to her.
"Ray...do you understand at all now what you are to me...do you understand that I Love your heart, your soul?" Yin asked.
"Yes...but I'm soo confused...I feel something for you...I don't know what exactly...I know you genuinely love me..." Ray said.
"You are such a sucker...I can't believe you just did that...you should just hand her the Nodiche and ask her to make it quick and painless...Right in the heart! Because you know she loves you so God damn much...fuck..." Ray's Shadow pestered him.
"Ray I can guide you...you are turning into a serpent...I can show you how to metamorphous instead into a serpent dragon...This will save both of us soon...Clay's Serpent saw what I have always seen ...but they have not been privy to the secrets of a Malfian Emperor...I take you straight to next level...You will become the XU Dragon!! I have foreseen this possibility...I believe this is why the Emperor fears you will join Markova. Yin said.
"Mmm k' well, my Yin, that sounds like a good plan, so guide away...I'm ready to learn." Ray said.
Yin ran up to Ray and wrapped her arms around him and put her head to his chest. "Love...This is what I fear most to tell you. This is where all my visions split and I don't know what will happen."
"Well, it works and I become a dragon, or I don't, right? So I can die...ok...well that sucks but... "
Yin interrupted, "No, my long-awaited vision...my postponed heart...this not so simple...You cannot know...because you have had the memories taken from you. Oblivion had nearly taken you...You wouldn't fight it...It would likely have taken you by now...It was believed by many that you would join Markova's ranks then, but something happened...things changed...Ahuru...took away your memories that were driving you to Oblivion in one last effort to save you, before you gave up and let Oblivion take you. I was going to be killed by you...by one I loved. Fate is the worst knowledge to know when you can't control it...I hid my tragic fate from the emperor as I know his rule is not the will of Buddha...he has become a evil man...then I wanted to finally see the man that lived and loved in so many visions."
Ray pulled Yin tight to him. "I never knew...why me...what memory did he take from me?"
"This is so hard for me...know that I, too, never expected this...3 days ago I was making peace with this and readying myself to move on...only when the Jadian emperor, himself, came to me and said that things have changed...that you must be killed before you can join Markova...only then did I know that you were not Shadow-fallen..." Yin explained.
"So why me?" Ray asked.
"I don't know...I guess I got pulled in by the first vision I had of you...you were alive...With Susan...You had spent a week running around town and planning the best birthday you could give her...she had already given up on the idea of wanting a relationship with you...and you knew that...but every ounce of your heart...every hour of your day was about her...planning...hoping...wishing...but most of all...loving. That day came and you sparked like a diamond...so little light need to be given back but there you were, a diamond like none that I have ever felt. I began hiding my visions of you away from the Emperor. As an oracle I was not allowed to let emotions like love enter me, as he said I would lose my ability to decipher visions correctly. This is when I learned to fight...both mentally and physically. I know what memory did he take from you...I saved this for last because it's important that you know everything other than this before you make your judgment...This is where everything is undefined...I have seen you a Xu dragon turning the tides of battle. I have seen your Shadow...killing me on this rooftop, I have seen you fly away in hatred of me...never to see each other again. I have seen Markova take over your body of your own accord. I have seen Markova turn you into a Specter-dragon, unleashing you upon your friends. I have seen you love me...I have seen me kill you...I could continue, but these are the main visions..."
"How could anything such a strong effect...what could be so drastic that it cause those things? Who is the Susan your talking about, I have a friend Susan...But you are mistaken if you saw that...that's not the way it was." Ray explained.
"This is going to be hard, Ray...For you, for me...please sit and close your eyes...Meditate on what I'm going to tell you for it will decide everything...like I said, you will be the judge...no withheld evidence or emotion...this is your path. It will take you where you choose to let it.
"Yin...wait...Just a second, then you can go on...I don't know if I will feel the same in a moment, so I just want to thank you for this...and for caring...mmm...and hopefully for not killing me any time soon!" Ray smiled. "So let's see what's in the hole in my mind."
"Farewell, my serpentine rose...and without further wait...I'll begin at your neck. The necklace you wear was a paired-set purchased by both you and Susan, who was the love of your life and tragedy of your life...death...and wraith-existence..."
Wraith Side-Story 18: "Second Chances"
