Fan Fiction ❯ Traveler ❯ Chapter 1

Journal Entry: Third month, seventeenth day. World of Pirithi.

Melting tones of fire and glowing clouds tinge the sky while I huddle under my blanket on this lonely crag of rock. The glittering ocean looks beautiful, but for my companions, it is the end of a journey, one that they may not survive. My path has taken me through countless world and innumerable planes of existence, looking for a place that my soul may rest and rejoin my ancestors. It has been close to a millennia and I'm tired, jaded by what I have seen and the suffering I have endured. Guess I'm a bit jealous of the people I now call friends, whether they die on this journey or not, at least their souls will rest.

My world was a dying one, a small blue world no longer lit by its warming sun. Long ago we were at the pinnacle of our civilization. Cities covered the little planet in glittering pools and towering towers that seemed to touch the sky itself. Machines did the work that once tied us down and we were free to peruse more intellectual and pleasurable pursuits. Pushing advancement in the sciences, expressing ourselves in art, and forever exploring the stars. Strife was unknown except for a few minor skirmishes every few years. It was peaceful, quiet, and by all means a utopia.

For all the knowledge we possessed, it was not enough to save this little corner of paradise. The sun had started to fade, dying slowly and casting our planet into darkness. Scientists fervently tried shooting exotic compounds and isotopes into the very heart of the sun with the hope it would jump start this failing furnace. Their efforts were in vain. The sun dimmed, cold winds blew on once warm plains, crops failed, and the people huddled in fear of the future.

As this once beautiful planet starved, wars broke out over the scraps that remained. A select few launched themselves into the cold darkness of space, to escape their fate, but most were left here to rot on this God forsaken planet. Men killed for a loaf of bread to feed their malnourished children. Society self-destructed it's remains were scattered to the winds. In less than three hundred years, our culture reverted to the stone age tribes we were several millennia ago. Caves and small huts replaced the towering cities, bows and arrows were now the tools of survival, we had fallen to our most primitive instinct.

We could sense the beginning of the end, like the stench of a decaying corpse borne by the wind. The days of my world were numbered, and all were desperate to delay the approaching apocalypse. My people place their faith in a fanatical prophet who proclaimed he could bring back the sun and happier days by sacrificing children to the sun god. That it could be recharged by feeding it pure and untainted souls. This sliver of a chance was all my tribe needed to regain the hope they had lost, no matter what lengths they would have to take.

For seven years a small frightened child was laid upon the high altar at the barely visible solstices and equinoxes to be offered up to the gods. Everyone believed that this was our only salvation, even my family. Lots were cast to determine which clan would give up a child, the final year of my normal existence, my littlest sister was chosen. My parents taught us only three rules, and they were essential ones.

Do what you must do to survive.
Defeat what threatens your existence.
Defend what you treasure the most.

Since my mother had died giving birth to Tilka, I had in essence become her mother. I raised her the best I could, though I was but a child myself. The gods be damned if they were going to kill my sister for a useless and desperate sacrifice. So under the cover of night I snuck the both of us out of the village, to hide in the thick woods. It didn't take the huntsmen of my tribe too long to find us though, and we were dragged kicking and screaming back.

Whipped like a common slave till my back was in ruins, my punishment left a crisscrossing web of scars that I bear even today as a reminder of what happens to those who defy the gods. Tilka was locked up and tied to the center post of the ritual lodge, trussed up like an animal till it was her turn on the altar.

I knew I could never get Tilka out past the men guarding the village, but there was no way I could let her suffer having her heart ripped out on a cold stone slab. So I snuck into the lodge and fed Tilka a bit of bread with poisonous herbs baked into it. I still remember how she crinkled her nose at its bitter taste and asked if I had accidentally dropped some lemon weed into the dough. Soon after she fell asleep, never to see the daylight, and never to suffer again.

The prophet was furious that his sacrifice was dead before the ritual and he demanded the heretic be punished. Naturally all eyes fell on me, and I did not deny what I had done. Unfortunately, the madman did have some real power after all. I was banished to roam the planes of existence as an undead spirit, never to rest in the afterlife with my ancestors. He thought it was fitting since I had destroyed their only means of prolonging life on that miserable planet, that I should be unable to enjoy the nirvana that awaited them after death.

I had taken my sisters place on the altar, ironically this was all I had ever wanted and it brought me a bit of joy. The prophet laughed as my soul was ripped from my body and cast to the winds of fate. I could feel his hands moving across my body, drawing out the essence of what I am, binding it with dark magics. My world faded and his cackling still rings in my ears.

To tell you the truth, I'm not quite sure how long I have been traveling between worlds. The years all seem to blend together. I do know it has been close to a thousand years though. Appearing on a new and different world with little more than the clothing on my back and if luck has it this journal in my pocket. I lived weherever fate threw me till I died or was killed. A few years on this world, maybe a few months on the next, there was even one I stayed in for a decade.

I am tired of it all, all I want to do is rest, but my path was chosen for me and all I can do is follow. It is here though that I have found something worth living and fighting for, something that I wish could last forever.

Now, though I am worlds away from my small desolate world, I follow the rules my parents taught me. Prthivi is not my planet, nor is it home, but I will fight tooth and nail to keep what little happiness I have found here.

To shelter and protect it from the coming storm.

OK, this is my first stab at writing fiction. So please be kind and review.

My muse lives for feedback, flames have a nice spicy flavor (or so he tells me).

This tale is going to be a long one, and is definately a work in progress.