See Part One for Disclaimers
Chapter Six
In Time Base, Cheri had one of those sudden jolts that feel like something inhuman has just danced a fandango on one's grave. She swiftly reviewed the people still alive who might have caused the feeling. Only two were frightening enough to cause the reaction. She doubted that Rand was loose again. She knew where he was. Sort of. She made a mental note to go retrieve the VR box from the sea off a cliff in Hawaii. She needed to check in on the Hawaiian angle anyway. Thank the Goddess Time Base could put her anywhere except exactly in her own past.
Grant and Elijah had left on a mission. No knowing how soon they would be back. Time Base kept its time subjective to the occupants so that you never, ever met yourself. That was one of the really big rules. No meeting yourself. A few operatives had broken that rule. None had survived.
"So, I can't go back and warn myself to ignore the trap?" Rayden questioned.
"Nope."
"But you could."
"Nope."
"Why not?"
"Because you are a major player in that time line. To warn a human would change very little, relatively speaking. You could save all the people Shao Kahn killed and it would not really change much in the time line. Not to the point of making a new one. On the other hand, if you don't go into the trap, you can't come out."
He frowned. "I'm not sure . . ."
"Yeah. Among other things, a certain gift to a planetary goddess would not be made. I suspect that is a primal incident. A thousand years of changes in you would be negated. The you I am speaking to now would cease to exist -- or . . ."
"Or?"
"There is a remote possibility that the choice made is a critical one in the paths of the worlds. An entire new timeline would diverge to accommodate both scenarios."
Blink.
Cheri grinned and laughed. "Yeah. I hate that one. The timeline you remember would continue on. The timeline in which you warn yourself would diverge and create a whole new set of parameters. Well, that's one theory."
"What's the other one?"
"That you meet and the entire timeline ceases to exist in a silent implosion." Cheri grimaced. "There is some indication that the latter is more likely than the former. There are whole areas of the time flux we can't access. Some of them are so alien we just aren't equipped to handle them. Some of them -- well, there are indications that within the area are voids and intermixed lines, situations so horrible for those within that all existing life forms are operating in what we would consider forms of madness. We're barred from those lines. It's a -- like dialing a phone and getting a busy signal." She took in Rayden's blank look. OK. Rayden current would understand this. Rayden not current didn't have a clue. "Hmm. I'm not quite certain how to explain it."
"You don't have to do so. I understand enough that I would not like to try the experiment. I can't warn my younger self. But I can step in once he is gone?"
Cheri considered this. She nodded, slowly. "Yes. Don't see why not."
"Because then he won't be here to see if I can recruit him," Mother's lush silvery voice chimed in as she materialized near by. Rayden was getting used to her coming and going. He didn't shy away from her voice as he had done earlier.
"I suspect I would be a very poor recruit," he responded dryly.
She gave him a warm look. "I think you would be a nice addition to our ranks. But I also think you have a time line to get back to, and that is the more important to you. I just wanted to let you know that our people who deal with such things have decided that whenever you want to go, you're ready for it."
His eyes brightened with unshed tears. "Thank you. I do need to get back. I let them down -- badly. My EarthRealm doesn't deserve what my pride led it into."
"Then go when you feel the time is right." She vanished silently.
He gave himself a shake. Sometimes being on the receiving end of that sort of thing was unsettling. He grinned at the thought. Perhaps he would be a little more considerate of his protégées from now on.
He waited until Grant and Elijah returned. He wanted to thank the golden haired man for his kindness and caring; and for allowing Rayden to bend his ear to the extent that he had.
Grant colored slightly and nodded. His smile was warmer than usual. They hugged and parted. Cheri got a bear hug from the thunder god. He gazed down into her emerald eyes.
"There is so much . . ."
"It's OK. You're going home. You know what to do. And what not to do. And, I suspect, at some point in time, you may find that there's a Yuconovich, or someone like her, in your own time line. Keep an eye out for her."
"I will. But no one will replace you and what you have given me. My Realm is at your feet."
"Well, pick it up before it gets tripped over," she responded wryly. "Now. It's time. No more gray. You are Lord Rayden, God of Thunder, Protector of Earth Realm -- go do your job."
He released her. Walked to the portal that awaited him. He turned and bowed respectfully to the trio who watched him. Then, straightening his shoulders, shimmering with power as his robes changed hue and form, he stepped through into the hidden city.
It was as he remembered it. The crowd was chanting Sha Ka, Sha Ka -- a corruption of the Emperor's name. He materialized on the pillar on which he had stood to rescue his heroes. This time, there were shadow priests everywhere, but only for a very few moments.
~*~*~*~
Omegis walked down the dusty road as she always walked, a combination of "come and get me" coupled with a little girl tip-toe. She could sense the shadow following her, she welcomed it, her eyes bright, her smile blinding. Death. Finally.
Only that wasn't exactly what happened. Oh, someone died, but it wasn't Omegis. The touch on her shoulder as the being reached for her triggered an unexpected reaction. Somewhere deep inside, Omegis wasn't quite as ready for death as she had thought. Reactions she had thought well and truly sat on sprang to her defense. The fight was short. Omegis called on both her prowess as a martial artist and her skills with magic, practically without thinking. She found herself staring down at the swiftly dissolving corpse of a shadow priest, her eyes wide, her mouth dropped open, her body falling naturally into a defensive stance. What was she doing?????
She looked back down the road to the hidden city. All this time, she had longed for death, had prayed for it to take her. Death came and she fought. Why? What was there to live for? Tshang Sung was -- gone. EarthRealm was going to be swallowed by OutWorld. Death and destruction would surround her, but not take her.
Revelation.
Omegis drew a deep breath, settled within herself and nodded. OK. If that's the way the gods wanted to play it, she would withdraw again. Only she her gaze was drawn again to the wall of rock surrounding the city. Idealistic fools, both Kung Lao and the citizens of the city. She turned to walk away, and could not. She turned back toward the city, a frown marring her lovely features. What did she care for mortals and their problems?
Lightning. Bolts of it from the blue.
Rayden?
Omegis found herself running toward the city. Toward destiny.
Rayden stood where he had stood before when he dispersed the crowd in the hidden city, when he had told them their god was false, when he had saved Kung Lao and his friends. He had appeared, not in a twinkle of godly power but in a frightening shaft of light. The shadow priests about to overwhelm the champions of EarthRealm shied back from the light. Taja and Siro were already down. Kung Lao hung on to consciousness with will alone. The anger in Rayden boiled up and over. Shadow priests vaporized in the light that played over them. Neither the residents of the city nor Kung Lao had ever seen anything like the outpouring of power that raged around Rayden. The open air temple shook with the energies that poured over and through the stones. And the stones, so long there, became sand, blowing away on the wind of Rayden's wrath.
Omegis watched wide eyed. She spied a shadow priest making his escape. Now what could she do about that? One had been easy enough to defeat. Her garb shimmered into a warrior's tunic. "Here, kitty, kitty, kitty," she murmured and went in pursuit. Of course. There's another portal. Like a cat, she licked her lips in anticipation. This should be fun. There was, of course, that matter of fact, I-really-don't-like-being-alone-and-immortal part of her brain that was objecting to all this heroic activity. She ignored it. This felt good, and that was something Omegis hadn't felt in a long time.
From a vantage point he didn't quite understand, Siro was watching Rayden -- and Omegis -- and a lot of things. For once, he felt as comfortable with the universe as he could remember feeling. He was aware of a sense of detachment, as though what went on did not really concern him Or it did, but only as a small part of the whole. He took a moment to nudge Omegis into action over the running priest. He looked at the fluctuating energies of the vortex open between the two realms. He nudged it and watched the power ripple away from him. He grinned. He knew how to counter the balance of powers.
Tug.
He blinked and found himself looking up into Rayden's face. The normally dark eyes were nearly solid silver. Blink. The god smiled at him. It was a tight smile, but it was sincere. Rayden offered him a hand up, which he accepted. He had a faint memory of -- he frowned at the vortex.
"We need to close that."
A look of regret. "How?"
Siro met the god's gaze. He told him. If Rayden was surprised, it didn't show. He merely turned, unbalanced the energies and shielded the people around him as the vortex exploded. Gate gone.
"Thank you."
Rayden turned his attention to Taja who pulled in a gasping breath, choked, sputtered and started breathing regularly. Kung Lao was the easiest to bring back from the brink since he hadn't fallen over yet. His head jerked up as Omegis and her captive joined them. He frowned at the sorceress.
She smiled back brightly. "I thought you might like to talk to this one. Disintegration is so -- permanent?" She forced the priest to his knees before the god.
"Why would I want to talk to one of Shao Kahn's shadow creatures?"
Kung Lao wondered about the harsh tone. It was unlike the Rayden he knew. He sensed there was something he didn't know. But now was not the time to ask.
"To find out where the other portal is?" Omegis suggested. She met the flickering look he gave her, the bright and carefully maintained mask she always wore perfectly in place. Inwardly she flinched a little. Having discovered that she wasn't ready to die, she was playing with fire here.
"Other? Portal?" Siro and Taja caught the extremely dangerous undercurrents in the softly spoken words. They hoped the Shadow Priest had sense enough to just answer Rayden.
Silence.
Rayden reached out and stripped the cowl and mask from the priest. Recoil. Anger turned to aghast horror. Beneath the mask there was no face, just a blank place. No features, no mouth, no nose, no eyes, no hair; a flesh colored egg on a neck. There were no answers there. He destroyed the creature with a gesture.
With another gesture, he took them out of the hidden city. Siro and Taja steadied each other as they arrived in Zhou Zhin. Without a word, he left the four of them there and vanished.
Rayden stood on a crag overlooking the hidden city. He wanted to smash it, turn it to dust. Yet he knew the people still there had been suborned by Shao Kahn, that they were not inherently evil. He could not bring himself to destroy them. Their belief was wrong, yet Shao Kahn had done nothing to the people of the city except give them hope. A second figure twinkled in beside him. A small god, red haired, blue eyed and scruffy looking. He seemed a bit surprised when Rayden shied away from his arrival.
"Hey! Relax. Just me. Thought I'd look in on the disturbance you're creating."
"I'm creating!"
He shied back himself. "Uh -- figure of speech. Honest." He took a good look at Rayden and noticed some changes. "Look -- I really just came to find out -- what was up. And if I could help."
That got a short laugh. "You? Help? Since when?"
"Aww -- c'mon. I'm not that bad."
"Trickster. Joker. Fool."
"Well. Yeah. That's me. But, hey, somebody's gotta keep the realms from taking themselves too seriously."
Rayden glowered, then looked thoughtful. He turned his gaze on the city and then back to his insouciant companion. The smaller man looked like he wasn't quite certain he liked the thoughtful look. Rayden nodded. He gestured and the smaller god's dress changed. He looked down and frowned himself.
"You don't think this makes me look a bit much?" His robes had been replaced with a black and white pattern a later time would recognize as Harlequin diamonds. A black mask obscured the upper half of his face.
"No. I think you look like a god who might supplant a false one. Who might lead these people away from their Sha Ka."
"Ah. As in --"
"As in lead them away from this city and power nexus, break the contact between OutWorld and EarthRealm."
"And I get?"
"Worshippers, believers, someone to play with." The words were innocent enough, although the underlying meanings could be read as somewhat sinister. Still, given the paucity of believers he'd had lately, Decer took it under consideration.
"OK. I can handle this."
"Good. Get them out of the city."
"Ah -- yes. Bye." Twinkle.
Inside the city, the demoralized worshippers of Shao Kahn were suddenly blessed with the appearance of a new god -- or maybe an old god in a new guise. It was hard to tell. Yet the words and actions of the masked one were those of promise. As their ancestors had been brought together and moved, so they were brought together and they would move. The time of promise was not yet here. One phase of their testing had come and gone; a new one would begin now.
Within days, the city stood empty, desolate. There was no one to witness its destruction as Rayden took stone to sand and flattened the area. No, not quite true. There was one witness. Omegis. She sat at a safe distance and watched as the city became nothing and less than nothing. Stone thrust up through the sand, filling the valley. A couple of Earth bound deities considered protesting, but decided against it. The changes weren't really doing any damage and Rayden was not in the mood to be understanding. Storm gods, always so hot headed.
Finally, Rayden sat on the top of one of the stone cliffs that had circled the city and stared at his handiwork. It didn't help. Once again, he was alone with his thoughts, his memories. The woman who had brought him back to change the history of his Realm had warned him this would happen, but it didn't make it any easier. Who did a god turn to for healing?
He heard a step on the rock behind him. He froze. A slender, well formed hand touched his shoulder as the sorceress knelt beside him. He turned his head to look at her. She could sense his hurt. Shao Kahn had taken so much from her. Immortality at Tshang Sung's side had appealed; alone, it was devastating. Yet Shao Kahn had take far more from Rayden. Oddly, Omegis had a sudden sense of double vision. The world she knew and the world as it had been before Rayden set it on a better path. Instinctively, she slid her arms around the god and held him, a sense of wonder and awe building within her.
For a moment, he was stiff and unyielding. Omegis was -- He shuddered. No, Omegis had never been one of Shao Kahn's minions. He yielded to her warmth, her offer of comfort. She hadn't planned on taking a god home with her, but the rock was not hospitable to other thoughts she was having.
A part of Rayden knew he needed to go to Zhou Zhin and reassure the trio there. Just, not yet. Besides, there were ways of thanking Omegis that didn't include relieving her of her immortality.
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