Moving away from that, gentle reader, I think it’s time I brought you up to speed with what Aunt Mandalee is doing right now, from my perspective.
As you know, she’s conducting an Illegal Time Intervention on my behalf, collecting my father from his walk just before his Ultimate Final Battle against Kullos. I thought she would bring him straight to me, which given my unique relationship with Time, will be a moment after I finish bringing my faithful readers fully up to date with everything that’s happened since the Fall of Kullos. Instead, she’s taken a bit of a detour.
*****
“Don’t worry, nobody can see us,” Mandalee assures Daelen.
Gazing on the scene below him, it’s difficult for my father to take it all in, I can tell. He can see it’s Elvaria, no question, specifically the area around Walminster where the old Council building is situated.
Gone are the standard medieval cottages and smoky chimneys. Gone are the days of horses for transport. Residential buildings can be whatever shape, colour and style the owners wish. A few change even as he watches. In the sky, transport pods race along Rainbow Roads that appear only when they need to, and transport pods provide instantaneous long-distance travel, including off-world, for those who can’t transport themselves.
As they fly over the city, Aunt Mandalee shows my father what looks like a holographic concert in a nearby arena. These days, live events are routinely beamed to other stadiums around the world and beyond. Other citizens are seeking their own entertainment with smaller displays that appear above the palm of their hands. Still more people are pulling up tourist information, as well as interactive map images and directions out of thin air, as well as news and weather reports.
“Your Council building is about the only thing that hasn’t changed since I last saw it,” Daelen remarks as they circle back around again.
That, gentle reader, was about a thousand years ago…or, from Daelen’s perspective, a few weeks.
The building’s outward appearance hasn’t changed because of its Protected status, but as Aunt Mandalee explains to my father, “It’s not our Council building, anymore. It’s the ‘Commonwealth Regional Establishment for the Advancement of Magic.’”
“CREAM,” Daelen says, realising the acronym.
You can blame me for that one, gentle reader. Long story short: there was a public consultation on the name. When it came down to a vote, my idea proved to be popular over the more sensible alternatives. Even so, certain officials continued to call it `the Magic Research Building`. How boring is that?
Mandalee moves their time on a bit as mages leave CREAM, the workday completed. Some are wizards and sorceresses while others have clerical symbols embroidered on their robes. Still more carry pouches on belts, containing spell ingredients for druid magic. Security personnel are wearing combat suits like Mandalee’s, while more workers wear a wide variety of other options.
Time moves on and rules change.
Mandalee returns the flow of time to normal. “Watch this.”
A sorceress in a black dress is the last to step out of the building. She fishes a small item out of a pocket, which Daelen probably assumes is a key. I’m sure he’s wondering quite what’s going to be so exciting about someone locking up, but when she presses her thumb onto the device, the entire building disappears. In its place, stands a recreational park with a children’s play area that kids quickly flock to.
“This is some amazing technology you have here,” my father breathes in wonder.
Aunt Mandalee smiles, triumphantly, as if he’s said exactly what she wanted him to.
“It’s not technology, Daelen, it’s magic,” she tells him. “Don’t worry, your mistake is understandable. After all, any sufficiently advanced form of magic would be indistinguishable from technology. All public and official buildings are open for business hours, plus extra for tourism, but outside of those hours, they’re stored away in a pocket dimension. It helps us to maximise green space even in large cities like this. This kind of magic is used across the world, these days.”
Mandalee moves the shadow warrior’s attention to the children who are now playing happily, and the adults who are walking, chatting, and setting up picnics in the park that wasn’t there a moment ago. Clearly, this is a typical, everyday experience for these people. Some of them appear human, some are Faery and others are a blend of the two – that’s commonplace, now. There are aliens in the mix, too.
The White Guardian asks Daelen to focus on one particular teenage Faery girl, wearing a strappy top that shows off her tiny, delicate winglets. She’s with a mixed group of six who are sitting and chatting together. Neither the girl nor anyone else is the slightest bit bothered by those wings. In fact, the boy sitting next to her, presumably her boyfriend, begins gently stroking them – an act the girl is clearly enjoying. They are too far away to hear their conversation, but from their body language, it seems as if there’s some friendly teasing going on between her and a human girl sitting opposite her. As Daelen watches further, the kids casually shapeshift into leopard cubs. They start chasing and play fighting with each other. They shift back, laughing at the game before shifting into different animals and running around some more. Eventually, they decide to go somewhere else, so they all change into a variety of birds and begin to flock away.
“Your world is astonishing!” Daelen cries out. “I’ve never seen anything like it!”
Aunt Mandalee’s smile is sad, and I know why. She’s actually doing it, so I don’t have to. She’s going to show him everything. I can hardly bear to watch and relate this, but I know I must.
“This isn’t our world, Daelen,” says Mandalee. “Not anymore. Oh, I’m not saying it was paradise. We had our problems, same as always, but for the most part, life was good. Until today.”
“Today?” Daelen wonders.
Aunt Mandalee hasn’t chosen any old random day for her tour: This was the day everything changed.
At her request, my father follows Aunt Mandalee, flying through the sky, following the birds that meet up with another group along the way, doubling the flock size.
“More kids?” Daelen asks.
Mandalee confirms it. “This is just a couple of groups of teenagers meeting up for a harmless summer night of fun around the city: chatting, laughing, shapeshifting, playing with perfectly safe magic. Just enjoying being young and carefree, you know? Remember the Faery girl with the wings?” Daelen nods. “The girl who was teasing her was Erren, her best friend. I visited their class in school not long before this, to give a talk on demons. Erren came to talk to me afterwards. Walked up to me bold as brass and told me she wanted to be a demon hunter when she left school. She told me she had a free period next and asked if I had time to teach her some moves. Shyleen liked her, which was good enough for me, so I spent maybe twenty minutes with her. She was good, and I told her if she kept working and training hard, she’d have a bright future. I also told her to go out and enjoy herself because that balance is important.”
“Good advice,” Daelen agrees. He still doesn’t understand why he’s there. He will, all too soon. “And here she is doing exactly that.”
Mandalee nods. “That was yesterday, relative to where we are now,” she tells him. “I just met Erren yesterday. I’m not going to say she ‘reminded me of me’ or anything so cliché, but she made an impression. I want you to know that, Daelen.” She’s crying now. My father has no idea why. “She mattered. They all did, even the ones I didn’t know. They all existed, and they all mattered.”
“Of course they did, why—?”
He’s fated never to get any further as the sky overhead grows black in an instant, not black as in night-time, but black as if the sky’s been ripped apart to reveal nothingness beyond.
Out of that void, comes a Monster that Daelen has seen only twice before. It’s one of very few things he’s ever seen that genuinely terrifies him.
“Don’t worry,” Mandalee reassures him, “we have better techniques for hiding ourselves in Time, these days. There’s no way he can see us or hurt us, but I can’t say that about anyone else around here.”
The void-creature pulls a great cannon out of a pocket dimension – it’s enormous – and casually shoots the flock of birds below him. They blink out of existence in an instant, and the blast continues, uninterrupted.
“No!” Daelen cries out in horror. “What kind of monster would do this? They were kids! They were just kids!”
Mandalee puts her arm around him, offering what comfort she can, even in her own misery.
“I know. One of them was Erren. That bright future that I predicted she would have – gone in an instant, and I’m supposed to be a Guardian of Time!”
A long travel pod train gets caught in the blast as it continues its path to the ground, where it leaves a quarter-mile diameter crater.
His next target is the concert they saw earlier. Almost a thousand people dead or seriously injured. Emergency services respond – they, too, are caught in further cannon blasts. Wizards, sorceresses, clerics, druids, warriors, fighters of all descriptions try to stop the void-creature, but the cannon rips through shields and armour like they’re not there.
Mandalee grabs Daelen’s hand and pulls him through Time a bit more. Amid the carnage, most of the defenders have abandoned their futile battle in favour of trying to evacuate the area. Their place on the battlefield has been taken by three figures: one is Mandalee dressed, as now, in a white combat suit. The two alongside her are male – Daelen doesn’t recognise them.
“The other Guardians,” Mandalee explains.
“Following in Dreya and Cat’s footsteps,” Daelen remarks.
“Hardly!” Mandalee snorts, but cuts off any questions he might have about that, indicating that he should focus on the battle.
The three fight with Temporal magic, using every bit of skill and power they possess, and at last, something slows the creature down.
“We have to help!” Daelen cries, desperately, trying to spring forward, but Mandalee holds him back.
“We can’t,” she insists. “I’m already there, and you can’t be here, yet.”
“Can’t you do something clever with Time magic?”
Mandalee shakes her head. “Even Time Intervention wouldn’t bring back Erren or any of the others, because they never existed.”
“Never existed?” Even as Daelen says the words, I can see he’s realised what she means. “No!”
“Yes,” Mandalee returns. “It’s destruction magic. True destruction. He didn’t just kill all those people, he unmade them.”
Very few even remember them, gentle reader. Pretty much just the Guardians and me. Official records are Timelocked, these days. They have to be to preserve them when the Guardians Intervene in Time. From those records, it is possible to prove the fact of Erren’s sixteen years of life. But she never existed.
“I had to go to Erren’s parents,” Mandalee continues. She can’t stop the tears and doesn’t try to. “I had to give them Erren’s records and break the news that not only had they lost a daughter, but they had also lost all memory of ever having a daughter. How in hell are they supposed to deal with that? How are any of them?”
Those records could tell them certain basic facts about Erren, but all the million family moments they shared are erased forever.
“I’m so sorry, Mandalee,” Daelen offers. He knows it’s inadequate, but what more has he to give? “I’m sorry this is happening to your world.”
“So am I,” Mandalee says, bitterly. “I’m sorry for everyone. I’m sorry for the victims, I’m sorry for their loved ones, I’m sorry for me, and I’m sorry for you.”
“For me?” Daelen frowns. “Why are you sorry for me?”
Aunt Mandalee freezes the Timeframe and zooms in closer.
“Gaze into the void, Daelen.” she tells him. “Think of it as a long, dark tunnel. There’s something inside. It’s difficult to see, but if you concentrate, really stare at it, let your eyes adjust, you will be able to make it out.”
My father takes her advice, staring deep into the hole in the fabric of reality in which the void-creature stands.
At last, he sees it, and his world comes crashing down around him. “No!” he gasps, disbelieving. “It can’t be!”
But it’s undeniable: the figure standing deep within the void, intent on raining true destruction all around, the Monster that killed my mother’s parents a thousand years ago, the so-called ‘void-creature’, he can see it clearly now.
“What kind of monster would do this?” Aunt Mandalee says, echoing his earlier remark. “You, Daelen. That’s why I say I’m sorry for you: You are that monster.”
*****
So now you understand, gentle reader, at least in part, the reason I embarked on this Illegal Time Intervention, asking Mandalee to take my father out of his Timestream and bring him here. The Monster that threatens us all, our world and all of Creation is my father. When the time is right, I will meet my father for the very first time in hopes that he can help me find a way to save the world...from him.
One thing I can’t do, as I gaze through Time, is read my father’s mind. I can tap into his telepathic communications and infer things from his words and actions, but his secrets remain his own, and I’m convinced he has many.
Above all, one thing about the story of the Fall of Kullos makes me suspicious. This is pure speculation, but I don’t believe my father really knew as much about the Wish barrier as he claimed.
Neither do I think his choice of the Earth shopping mall as the venue for his revelation of this power and Heaven’s Surrender was random. I can think of nowhere more distracting for a pair of Tempestrians of that age. Had it not been for those distractions, I am sure my mother would have picked up on a rather large inconsistency in his story.
He claimed, or at least implied, that he invented the Wish barrier as a defence against the great Enemy that had been trying to wipe out his people as she had so many others before.
But consider this, gentle reader: Does my father really seem like he had that level of technical expertise; he who went into every battle with all guns blazing?
Among the people he had hired to look after his facilities over the centuries, he had always had one with a good head for technology. Around the time of the Fall of Kullos, Sara had fulfilled that role. She had more technical expertise than he would ever have but she couldn’t have invented the Wish power. Even in my time, such a thing would be beyond the resources of every world in the Commonwealth, worlds of high magic and high technology both.
Why would my father lie? I can’t be sure. Maybe some secrets were too important to share with anyone, even my mother. The question is, if I’m right, who really created the power he called the Wish? Some other player that history has forgotten or omitted from its pages? I don’t know, but I’m gambling that finding the answer to this question, among others, will bring us closer to ending the threat we now face.
But that’s only part of the story. There’s much more to come. Right now, I need a break to collect my thoughts and check on my captives, but when I return, I can tell you about the early exploits of the Original Three Guardians. Their victories, defeats, mistakes, and triumphs, and I will also begin to tell you about the most dangerous threat they ever faced: Purity of Angels.