The Spider's Ballet

Chapter 006: Clocks Reversing -001

The empty train tracks snaking their way through the desert ended where long dead spires jutted out from beneath the sands like a claw built of metal and wire and halted from reaching the edge of the sky. The sun was setting to the west and on the far eastern side of this landscape, the lights of conflict were blazing. Eruptions of blue flame and wispy sparks of purple lighting blew through the abandoned structures. Within the landscape of the dead buildings in concrete streets, yet to be ground away, no clear side was evident. It was a desperate plight of survival for any individual.

The younger Cherry had longer hair but was still wearing white gloves and a bag tossed over a white shirt and black slacks that was all covered in dust and blood. Her sleeves rolled up, she held a pistol fast to her chest with her left hand and a thin sword with her right. Running to catch up to her was a woman with long black hair, a patch over the right eye, and a black cloak. She slid through the sand beside her for cover, sticking a rifle out into the open and firing a spark of blue fire towards the first set of glowing yellow eyes that made themselves known.

The dark-haired woman motioned to the empty floor of one of the taller buildings. They both ran inside where Cherry hastily put her weapons away and began smashing buttons on the wall until they lit up with a slight white hue. Several of the yellow-eyed creatures with sinewy gray flesh had rushed into the building before a much larger creature stepped in front of them. He wore a leather jacket and a brimmed hat. Standing almost seven feet tall, with a two-handed sword with a blade bluntly crafted from stone or bone. His eyes were also slightly yellow but with focused pupils, while his revealed flesh was more pale than gray. He cleaved several of the other creatures before nodding back at the women. "The time to flee is now, ladies."

Two metal doors slid open, and they made their way inside while slamming buttons in a flurry again. It trembled before beginning a slow descent. Cherry took a deep breath. "I need a cigarette. Also, who the hell was that?"

The one eyed woman said, "That was Tukrit. Also a fallen, but a coherent one. They hate the feral fallen as much as we do. He was a prisoner here voluntarily. He told me the story one night about how he followed rumors and half truths to this place in order to find some fairy tale queen of the Fallen."

The woman clad in black then kicked the wall before ranting, "This is only your second day here. You and that crazy guy show up and this docile camp turns to shit within hours. They told me that Cherry was an agitator when the Lux hired the Black Wings to sit here, wait you're your arrival, and help you escape this prison. They didn't tell me you would show up with him. The hell was he thinking? Desdin lost everything when the Wardens of the Farland fought with the Oldest Ivalic, and only then to show up here with the mind to have a go at Ouren, another one of the Oldest. I'm suicidal for taking this job, but he wants to die in the most over the top way possible."

Cherry rolled her eyes. "Yea, well, I spent the entire train ride here stitching him back together. The chaos Desdin brought here made it possible for us to leave. Whatever he did threw Ouren into shock, which shut down the prison. I'm going to take him with me to the Lux. His father was kind to me." She held herself as she seemed to be lost in thought for a moment. "Jonah was beloved by the Lux. Desdin inherited his will."

The woman with dark hair pulled her hood over her head. "The loss of the wardens is huge. His safety is not my job though. Queen Emeralas is offering sanctuary in Dragonshead for Union dissidents. I could help you stay low there until the Lux comes to get you, but now that the Warden King Jonah is dead, big cities will be off limits to Desdin. Even though his name may not be known, people are bound to recognize him in a hub that had videos and images of the wardens. By siding with the Union Esthea helped spare his life, but that was the extent of the Union's mercy for him."