See Part One for Disclaimers
Part Two
Kaeisha and Shao Kahn stepped into the void. Shao Kahn shied slightly. They were standing on -- nothing. Below them was a seething, whirling maelstrom of light and plasma. Opposite them was a -- shadow? A shaft of -- lack of light? Something. Shao Kahn looked at the woman. She glowed in the darkness. She looked -- calm.
"What is it?"
"The Cauldron of Creation. Where all life begins."
"And that?" he gestured with one golden gauntleted hand.
"The dark side."
Shao Kahn considered this. "Then why am I here?"
She turned her face to him. She knew what he meant. She smiled. "What is dark without light?"
What? He considered this. "Total -- darkness."
"What is the point?"
"To -- win?" Shao Kahn felt he was missing something here. He considered his past, OutWorld. If the realms outside ceased to exist -- Hmm. Not good.
Kaeisha held out a hand to him. "Shall we begin, little brother."
He stepped forward, still standing on nothing, which was somewhat disorienting. Behind him, Kaeisha burst into light, a shaft of colors in the darkness. The shadow on the other side became darker, a portion detached and moved forward, forming a vaguely humanoid form wielding a shaft of darkness. He was uncertain about this fight. Then he felt power as he had never known flow through him. The fight began. He became a weapon for light. He roared with laughter at the thought.
The battle was long. Stars were born, lived and died. The cauldron seethed beneath them, spawning monsters and heroes, gods and demons, life and death. Just when Shao Kahn thought he could not lift his blade again, the other wavered, shimmered and dissolved. The shadow on the other side retreated, away from the rim of the spinning realm of creation below them. Power flowed through him, then outward, breaking into gold and silver and multicolored streak and then bits and pieces that fled across time and space, throughout the realms. He turned to Kaeisha. She was smaller, the shaft of colored light gone. She reached a hand to him.
"Swiftly. We must go," she said breathlessly, the voice of a young woman, no longer the receptacle of all power. He took her hand, the gateway roiled into existence, sucking the two of them away from the void and into -- OutWorld. For a moment, they stood on a pinnacle, gazing down at Shao Kahn's realm. It seemed colder, darker than he remembered.
"What? --"
"Time has passed. Without your hand, the Realm is less than it was, life is fleeing even as we speak. I return that which was taken."
His hand burned, power welled up within him. He bellowed, in pain, in joy, in terror, in understanding. All that Shao Kahn had been, all that he was, all that he would be -- all of this flooded through the massive being that was Shao Kahn. A lesser entity would have gone mad -- madder? Might have died. But Shao Kahn stood his ground. For good or evil, this was who and what he was. This was his realm. And it was his choice where that realm would go.
He looked to the woman and blinked in surprise. A child, just on the verge of womanhood, open faced and innocent, stood where the usurper of his power had been. Silk in muted shades of the rainbow and darkness swirled about her slender form. Her hair was a gold glinting halo about her face. She smiled at him, inclined her head and was gone.
Shao Kahn bellowed again. He was home.
~*~*~*~
A hundred years had passed since Rayden arrived on the doorstep of Ryland Imports.
Kung Lao looked at the gathering and shook his head. He had changed not at all in the years since the last Mortal Kombat. He looked to where Rayden sat at the head of the table set in his honor. He smiled warmly. Rayden looked very much the proud patriarch -- as he should. Half the children here were his descendents by three successive wives. The rest were Siro's and the children of the school that they had founded. He wondered what Siro, his wife and Taja would make of this gathering, almost a small town. Sometimes the pride and joy in his heart were almost too much to keep inside. He met Rayden's eyes and smiled again. He walked in to join the party.
Rayden looked at his protégé, as youthful looking today as ever. His eyes ranged over the rest of the gathering. Siro's children and their children and their children. Three generations of his descendents who bore great resemblance to the hero and his lovely oriental wife. And there was always one of them always standing guard on Rayden. It amused him these days. Shao Kahn's attacks had ended with Rayden's godhood.
His own descendents were an intriguing mix of looks, oriental and not. He still stared at them with wonder. Three women had granted him their companionship over the years. All three had given him gifts of love in the children they created together. It was amazing.
He caught sight of one of the copper haired Taja-Lings. Sadness. One of his biggest regrets was Taja's loss within the first year of his mortality. The earthquake had surprised the city. Taja, caught outside, had given her life to save that of a child in the way of a falling wall. The child and the kittens she had been moving to safety had survived, shielded by the thief's body. Orphaned by the quake, Li Ling had come to live with Rayden, Siro and Kung Lao; as had the cats.
When grown, Li Ling had informed them that she wished to change her name to Taja-Ling Li, to give her name the more common local form and to honor the woman who had died protecting her. She had also informed Siro that if he did not marry her, she would not marry. Ever.
Siro had given her an odd look, smiled warmly and accepted her proposal. They had been together for the rest of his life. Neither of them had an explanation for why all six of their children had been born with coppery red hair and eyes that fluctuated in color between hazel, green and blue.
Rayden wiped a suspicious wetness from his eyes as Kung Lao joined him.
"Hell of a party."
"Yes, it is," Rayden agreed with a laugh. "100 years of peace and quiet. Sometimes I wonder if we'll ever know what happened."
"I think I'll be happy if I never hear from OutWorld again." He thought for a moment. "Then again, immortality could get lengthy if the Kombat is never called again."
"Yes, it could."
The party continued for two days before it wound down and most of the guests went home. Dalao, Kung Lao’s youngest Master teacher, set out the "Open for Classes" sign and the students returned to work. Taja-Ling Kai brought Rayden breakfast, straightened his room and went out again. She was certain the old man was not much longer with them, his face was skeletal, his walk slow and aided by a cane. Soon, there would be no Grandfather, and that saddened her. She loved his tales of the old days, of the Realms and of the fights with strange beings from those other Realms. Life was so quiet.
Kung Lao came down to begin classes with his chosen fighters, the best of the best out of the school. He wasn't certain that there was any real need, yet there was a special pride in knowing that these students were as good as they came. Halfway through the opening exercises, he heard Rayden scream. The students knew he was fast, but teleportation had not originally been on the curriculum. Kung Lao was through the door of Rayden's room almost as fast as thought, and without knocking. He stopped inside. Rayden was standing in the middle of the room.
"Rayden?"
Slowly, the frail, stooped figure straightened. Kung Lao could see the shudder run through him, yet he seemed somehow more solid. His robes, pale gray by preference, seemed to shimmer and change. White and blue. The thin white hair thickened, darkened. He let the cane fall. Slowly he turned to face Kung Lao, his face a study in stunned disbelief. The lines of a hundred years were gone. His hands were strong and smooth again. Plasma played in the depths of his dark eyes.
"It's -- back," he said simply, his voice sounding as stunned as he looked. "I don't know," he answered the questions in Kung Lao's eyes. "I don't know. I -- Kung Lao, I have to go. I'll be back." He stepped forward and gripped Kung Lao's shoulder for a moment, then vanished in a twinkle of light.
Taja-Ling Kai charged into the room, having made her way through the crowd of students outside. She looked around. "Kung Lao? Where is Grandfather?"
"Gone. He's -- back."
Kai made a face. "That made a lot of sense. He can't be -- both." What she saw in Kung Lao's face made her stop. "Back. Back? As in: BACK??"
"Yeah," Kung Lao agreed with a laugh as what he was attempting to convey sank in fully.
"Oh, wow," she said in the inimitable succintness of youth. "Gran's never gonna believe this! The store!" She pelted out and down the stairs to the part of the old structure that housed the shop once started by Taja.
Kung Lao looked at the curious faces ringing the door as he walked out of the room. He could see the same question in all of them. He just smiled, shook his head and shooed them back downstairs. Eventually, Rayden would show up again. He hoped.
~*~*~*~
Lord Rayden, God of Thunder, Protector of EarthRealm, protector of the champions of Mortal Kombat, entered the realm of the elder gods with some trepidation. He was surprised by the greetings of his brother and sister gods. Yes, they knew what had happened, but not why. They had not expected to see him again and were overjoyed at his return to their councils. They had no answers for him. They could not intervene when it happened, they could not tell him who or why, only that apparently it was over.
In a quiet moment, he found himself with a couple of child-gods who regarded him with peculiar fey looks in their eyes. They approached him solemnly and both inclined their heads in honor to him. He regarded them for a moment, uncertain as to who and what they were.
"We are the protectors of the fading," they told him, their soft voices in unison, harmonics playing around their words.
"The fading?"
"Magic. The non-dominant races of the realms, the livers in secret places, the ones who will be known only in children's tales. These are ours." They looked at each other out of fawn colored eyes and back at him. "Come. You walk two paths. Perhaps it is you who need to see."
Each took one of his hands and led him away from the gathering. They moved through the realm until they came to a dark place. He could feel power. He could sense -- maybe he didn't want to sense this. He tried to release his hands from the two. They held fast.
"Do not fear. We will not see you harmed. But this must be known to the one who has been god and man." Their voices wove spells about him. He continued forward, his heart thumping in trepidation. He did not want to admit he was afraid.
A door opened, soft golden light showing through. At their silent urging, he stepped forward. He was enveloped in -- in -- love? tenderness? He felt as thought his heart would break in sorrow and fly in joy. What was this place?
A child, female, younger than the gods who had brought him here, stepped forward out of the light. She smiled at him, all gentleness in that smile. "Greetings, Rayden."
He bowed to her. "My Lady."
She laughed, a child's happy trill. "Hardly that, Thunder God, father of heroes."
He looked into her golden eyes, startled at her words. Yet he saw the truth there. Father of heroes. "Kung Lao?"
"Has his place. Hero. Teacher. Lover. Father. Guider. He wears as many faces as his mentor does. You have done well, child of the Younger Gods."
Younger Gods???? Younger???? He saw the truth in her eyes. His kind were the elder gods of the realms they knew now, but there were older entities who oversaw even the gods of the realms. He felt humble and exalted at the same time.
She chuckled again. "You do well, Rayden. We will meet again."
The light receded. Rayden found himself in the dark again. The twin gods led him back to the gathering of gods. They left him in a quiet space. Somehow, they surmised he might need some quiet to digest all of this.
~*~*~*~
Kung Lao wandered down to breakfast to find Rayden there before him. It was going to take some time to get used to him coming and going like a god, again. Rayden looked up and smiled. Then again, maybe not.
Finis
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