Interlude 10
#39 of Among Stars
Part of: Among Stars (Prequel to 'The Golden Month')
The story of how a crew of misfits shattered the dominance of the Empire's tyranny.
Their victories, their losses, and their ultimate fate. An odyssey across the endless frontier that is space!
Las Lindas Web Comic Spin-Off, OC-Insert
The characters in this story (Except the OC-Insert) are © chalodillo
Interlude 10
Beta-Reader: Ant0nius
Things were getting interesting.
Or at least... different.
Pandora wasn't one who normally placed her whole faith behind someone... but she could tell this time she was dealing with someone she could at least put some trust in when it comes to fixing the mistakes made by gods and believers of the two factions. Not like she did back with that foolish Narakhan, not with the repeat of being backstabbed by him again. Time and time again she had stopped to think of her mistakes, of her wrong choices. Not just about the way the Emperor came to be. No, even before that.
When things were simpler, when people were simpler... when she once wasn't the Chaos Goddess. Back then... she wasn't a mortal. Not even a deity. No, she was something known and yet unexpected. Light shined over her path, providing her a prosperous future as a true Queen of Prism. She was beloved, blessed with her subjects' smiles and consent. Even the most stubborn of the Fire users knew of her and respected her soul. It was all so beautiful and worthy of keeping going for eternity. She had the means to last for a long time, her divine duty as a Crest never once restrained or forgotten. A beacon of hope for all clans, a true unifying figure that... made a mistake. Or not.
It was still difficult for her to fully grasp the extent of her 'crimes' as the Dragon Gods had committed, especially when she felt she could have done that again. And always. It all started with a crisis, then a hard decision from her parents and... finally an empty crib beside hers. It all happened before she could remember something so monumental, and when she did... things were already turning into a real issue. A claimant appeared, one she had been left unaware of, and instead of any known magic bestowed to them by their deities, he bore the power that was the darkest of them all. She never took part in a war before that.
Fighting? Yes. Warring and taking decisions about who lived and who didn't. That felt atrocious. Her heart throbbed in pain with each step taken, with each clue retrieved with each victory. For Chaos was her enemy back then, and yet such mighty power was harnessed by a few rebels with no control over it. They were suppressed, subdued, but so was her drive to go beyond that and take a personal decision on their punishment. One of them stood out from the rest, their leader. He looked so brazen, so unbroken. He thought that victory was on sight. His army was decimated, his followers scattered and then imprisoned, and her body bound by magic and chains.
A pitiful demise for someone that she would learn once had the title of 'brother' to Pandora. The truth left a strange sour taste in her tongue. Something was still missing, something that her mother's diaries addressed as a nefarious day for their family. A prophecy, a decision to try and subvert it... but said decision enabling such a future to happen. Pandora started to hate prophecies ever since that discovery. Her brother was shunned due to the words of an oracle that had no real connection to the Gods. The practice was rendered unlawful through their deities' permission... but she could tell there was something more than just that. She kept on studying, even delving in some tomes about chaos that her deranged sibling had left behind. It was there that the former Queen stumbled on another shocking news that left her stunned and worried. Her twin sibling died while his mate held his firstborn. An heir. It didn't help when the Dragon Gods sought to banish the Chaos Cultists, the Narakhans, off to their 'new' homeworld.
An endless desert with little chance of reprieve from the heat. A world-wide prison that would pit them all one against the other. It was barbaric, brutal, but 'just' as the deities' messengers were keen to highlight it to be. It felt dreadful to imagine the young child that would have been her nephew or niece being subjected to sins caused by their parents, not themselves. It was unpleasant and it pushed Pandora to dig more into the matter, to try and build a proper case to it. She knew it could be done, the Gods listened to them as much as the Dragons listened to their subjects. Never once their harmonious relationship felt damaged or close to weaken... that was until she brought up that case to the Deity.
'Save the children, they are not recipients of their parents' sins'. It was their right, she added. And the Gods... refused. Any chance to contain chaos, to redeem the newer generations of Narakhans, fell on deaf ears. This defeat stung worse than anything she had been dealt with before. At the time, she wasn't celibate. She had a husband, she had two beautiful children and... and then it happened. She felt the bile and the horror of such denial provide her with a vision, one that further left her dreading for the state of her now-distant family.
A child slept on the cold ground of a dark cave. It was one of the few cool places to hang out and rest. It was safe, both from the atrocious heat of the planet but also the various monsters that lingered within that realm. No hints of maliciousness in their heart, only fear. Why? That's what they were whispering ceaselessly, almost expecting an answer to that question. Pandora's heart broke at the terrifying sight. A youth left to perish in such a way, because there was no way for him to resist through that night or beyond. Too young, his life was spoiled into damnation... and it hurt her immensely.
Something had to be done, she decided, and that's where Pandora could remember was where her first big mistake struck her. She retrieved the booklets her brother left behind, the studies he put behind chaos and... the queen studied those even more. One intention, a benevolent one that should have ended peacefully and happily. But as she would soon learn, and even now bore as a medal and burden of her own past mistakes, things were never that easy.
After all, the road to hell is paved by good intentions.
d-d-d-d
d-d-d-d
d-d-d-d
AN
This is 'part 1' of Pandora's origin. That's where the real 'AU-creating' factor originates from. A queen taking a different chance and trying to change things for good. Trying being the keyword.