Enter Abyss

Chapter 1; Jumping off a cliff is NOT a good way to start one's morning.

Seventeen years later...

The wind was blowing with a gentle ferocity, dashing to and fro like invisible spirits playing a wild game of chase. The sky, cloudless and filled with the warmth of a golden sun, was an azure blue, stretching above the land like the infinite dome of a cathedral. Wide and fathomless as the ocean. And in that ocean, birds swooped and dived, their feathers shimmering as if they were made of crystals. It was a glorious day, filled with life and wonder.

A perfect day to be jumping off a cliff.

"Why is it always ME?" Cogs complained as Archer strapped the last bit of his latest contraption to his friend's body.

"You're just good at it, that's all." Archer replied cheerfully.

"Hm, good at being an idiot, you mean?"

"Yes, exactly, you're a wonderful idiot. And anyway, you shouldn't complain; when have my inventions ever failed?"

"Oh gods forbid...let's not go there."

Grinning, Archer brushed his shoulder length red hair out of the way and stepped back to admire his work. Cogs looked like a boy with a small airship strapped to his back, which made sense seeing as there WAS a small airship strapped to his back. A flying machine, really-- or rather, a gliding machine since it was incredibly hard to strap a furnace to one's back to make steam. Archer only knew this from experience.

"You look marvelous!" he said enthusiastically. "Like a descendant of Charious himself."

"I feel like a tin can. A tin can that is about to be hurled off a cliff."

Archer resisted the urge to smack his friend; Cogs was, after all, putting his life on the line for the sake of science... and possibly a date with Piper. He just wished he could be less whiney about it.

Archer was debating whether it would be ethical to simply PUSH Cogs off the cliff when Piper came bounding up to them like a friendly red-haired kitten. "What's going on here?" she asked, her green eyes lighting up with an excited-- and possibly manic-- look. Piper, or Pip as she would rather be called, was short, slight in build, and had hair that looked as though two hedgehogs had just been wrestling in it. Her freckled face was, more often than not, smeared with dirt or some other sediment, and she radiated the energy of a fireball. Archer noted that her knuckles were scraped and bleeding, which meant that they would have to be careful on their walk home and look out for whoever she had decided to pick a fight with today. Her clothes-- mostly things she had nicked from Archer's own wardrobe-- were splattered with a bit of blood and the long, brown aviator's coat that she always wore was torn at the sleeves. Her goggles were on askew and the knees of her breeches were ripped to expose pale skin beneath.

Archer shook his head; Pip loved picking fights and while she could beat any boy on the street, he was starting to wonder if it was, perhaps, NOT the healthiest habit in the world. Shaking his head and snapping back to the present, he let his enthusiasm bubble over and quickly began explaining the flying machine mechanism that he had been working on for weeks.

"Sounds wonderful." Pip replied, bouncing up and down on her toes. She definitely shared in her cousin's enthusiasm as well as fiery red hair.

"Oh, yes, don't mind me." Cogs called out miserably, his blond hair being whipped back and forth by the wind. "I'm just about to be PLUNGED off this cliff is all."

"Do you mind if I watch?"

He gave her a look, "You have no respect for the dead, do you?"

"You look alive to me, so far. Archer, he's going to come out of this alright, right?"