《The Firefly Diary》Chapter 22: Legends, Reflect
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"What do you mean that Mosor has gone?" Lantorn asked, as she searched the complex. All she saw were the still faint, but colored friends of Mosor. She scanned each inch.
Arber shook his head. "She is not the same as she was. The tree, it fell apart." He struggled to regain his breath as he sat in the corner, hyperventilating, thinking about what he saw, which made no sense to him. "I think she turned into something. She fused with something."
Lantorn said, "Alright, one of the locks needs three of the traits. If none of these guys have any, then we will have to make do with you and I. Dependability will work. If we can grab Vanos, then we have the final part to the puzzle, I think."
Arber said, "Lantorn, back down now."
Lantorn let out a rumbling growl and said, "I have come too far. Lhyna will inflict a world of fear upon us all. She thinks about a hard reset. You will fear me, then."
Arber said, "I am afraid of Mosor. You have to get out right now." He walked over to an elevator shaft, and pressed a button. Lantorn entered too.
Arber said, "This is our last stop. Let's get to the top, hide, and find a way down." Arber gave a nod to Lantorn and two thumbs up to make her agree with him.
She told him, "You can cower because you live in fear. Lhyna thinks that is how the world should work. We live in fear, we work in fear. I have no fear." Arber gawked at her.
"You have fear too, Lantorn," Arber said. "I have fear too." The elevator turned off, and fell into darkness. "That is not good."
Lantorn told him, "Break open the top of the door." He shook his head, not knowing much about how a shaft would work. "Punch into it."
He resigned to punching a hole into the top of the elevator, and she climbed up. She saw the rope, and knew she had little chance of climbing it. "My paws are not for climbing."
He climbed up onto the roof of the shaft. He saw the darkness, and the machines and inner workings of the complex. "What if I cut the rope and we fall down? That could kill us."
Lantorn said, "It is a height of two feet. We got about two feet up." He grabbed tight onto the ropes and wrapped his knees around. With a pumping of his arms he pulled himself up. He took a deep breath, and forced himself up again.
"Alright, dark moon starts with an eclipse," Lantorn said. "Then the moon will transfer to a dark moon because of the alignment of the moons." She muttered the information to herself. Voto had several moons. The biggest was Lhyna's domain, and called the moon. The others they never saw until the rare eclipse moon. One moon made the eclipse, while a dark moon shone in the air.
It would be Lhyna's moon that was dark, but Lantorn thought about the eclipse moon. "That must have its own god or goddess, right?"
Arber wheezed and asked, "What are you thinking about?" He was five feet up, after a minute of climbing. Lantorn looked not impressed by this task. "Something about a new goddess."
Lantorn said, "You have to admit it is a thought. We have, like, four moons, and we know only the goddess of one, then? I think the rest must have gone somewhere, or are smart enough to stay hidden, deep low. We have one that controls psychic, and fear."
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Arber resumed climbing. Lantorn realized he had about thirty minutes until the eclipse ended. It was a long eclipse that was working.
Lantorn said, "I think the moon is about to pull over. Climb like your life depends on it because I will end it, got that?"
Arber glowed as did his vines, and he got the urge to keep climbing. The dependability of Arber was good, because that was his trait, for better or worse, worse for most part now. Arber finished the climb and got to the top.
He sat down, and tugged on the rope, and Lantorn felt herself lift. This was going to be about three minutes long. She had enough time, long as she got to the altar of the Eater of Planets, then she won. Lhyna would beat Vanos, and they would meet. This was the last stop. She took a deep breath as she knew her fate once she got to the top.
She became eye level with Arber, then she hopped off and into the main library of the floating castle structure, seeing all the wonders. Books flew and sorted themselves, as clockwork gears spun around. Steam came from brass whistles, and blew on red, velvet shelves.
Lantorn pushed a button on the side of the shaft, and it kicked on more gears a new platform rose them up and onto the roof.
They stood on the roof, and saw a temple, the last bit of marble formed in a building only a few feet tall. Lantorn jumped onto it, and focused Arber on the keyhole, which was where the sword went. Two locks, still. "We still won this fight." The eclipse came into view.
The moon covered the sun, as a different moon stood on the opposite side and faced the other moon and the sun, and was black too. The sky and all light disappeared for a moment as the events occurred. "I think I won," Lantorn said, and laughed. "I won, I won, I won, I won."
***
Vanos ducked underneath a punch being launched by his copy. He had little room to move, since the walkways had been no more than five feet wide around, and crumbled. Still, using that to his advantage wasn't hard.
"Mynt," he said. She focused away from her copy, and nodded at him. She jumped up onto the back of the copy, and took it to the ground.
Lhyna shook her head. "You wolves could all fear your neighbors, and return to your own lives. Once you settle out how you live amongst yourselves, then you can rejoin the world."
Vanos took a look at Lhyna, before taking a shot at bucking his copy. Mynt pushed the copy over and it fell down thousands of feet to the ground. It shattered on impact.
The original ice cream pack stared down their three copies. Spir ran forward, and Paynut jumped on top of her. Paynut jumped over, flipped, and hit his back into the snout of Paynut Reflect.
Choclox, the biggest of them, headbutted into her copy. Her copy reached underneath her and lifted her up.
Paynut ran over, and jumped onto Choclox Reflect's back, and got into a chokehold with his arm. The copy dropped Choclox, who slid between the copy's legs and lifted it up.
Spir charged, and dodged her own copy before jumping on its arm. She hopped onto its head, and used it as a launching pad to knock into Choclox Reflect, causing it to fall down. They all cheered as Choclox Reflect died.
Lhyna shook her head. "You are all trying too hard. Tenaciousness, I see, makes you fight but you could stop the fight. You could all live back in nature, like I do, on the moon. Never taking more than I need. You all are steeped in capitalism, in ice cream."
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Mynt and Vanos sidestepped Mynt Copy, and bucked the back of Mynt Reflect's knees, making it buckle, before they did a second kick to make it double over.
Vanos told Lhyna, "Shut up. You think you have a right, to tell others how to feel, and act? It's you that needs to live in fear, and reset yourself."
Lhyna shook her head, watching the fight from a distant pathway.
Paynut stood on the backs of his sisters, before they both charged. He jumped up, and his sisters took down Choclox Reflect. He did a flip and landed on the Reflect with a shatter after, taking one more down.
Spir Reflect flexed, before charging at the three, but they met with bucks to Spir Reflect's midsection, taking it down. Choclox came in, and pushed Spir Reflect over and out of the ring. That was four down, one to go.
Mynt Reflect stood back up, and all five members came, before running and pushing Mynt off the edge, to its death. Death being for lack of proper term. It was only a construct. Not a living thing.
Lhyna said, "You did a good job taking down the five Reflects. Now let's see what I should do next? How about we start raising the limits?"
Then, a lack of sound. No wind turbines whirring below the island. Lhyna noticed first. "That's not what I meant, but okay." The castle rumbled.
It fell, and the wolves only knew as they left the ground. Lhyna said, "Someone shut off the power! I wonder who?" She knew only one solution. She had to change the rules.
As the five embraced, they began floating. The castle fell and for miles, the boom echoed. Dust kicked up, and from that dust came the army they had.
Lhyna said, "New rule, moon gravitational pull activated." The dust cleared up, and the castle seemed to be more ruined than before. It was chunks of rubble, with only the temple intact.
Vanos shouted, "Mosor! Kyofi! Ahmond!" He thought as he stared down. The rest of the ice cream pack yelled too, but he drowned it out. If all of them had been trapped, that meant they had been crushed. They might have been dead.
They might have been dead.
She killed them. He stared at her, his eyes bulging from his skull. He still had the goblet, and wind worked.
He used the wind goblet to propel him towards Lhyna. He prepared his fangs for her throat. She grinned, and her eyes glowed bright.
Her claws gained a light aura as they grew an armor. She slashed at him, and grabbed the goblet, before kicked him away. She ended the pull, causing him to drop.
They all dropped, and screamed. Lhyna used the goblet to suspend herself in a bubble of wind, as the gravitational pull ended. It was nice to see them fall. She told them they would live in fear, and now they did.
They all fell down, but a net of light caught them. Lhyna blinked and floated herself down to the altar. She saw no Lantorn or Arber, only the gem and mirror.
Lhyna said, "Let's begin." She put the goblet upside down, before placing the gem on it. This made a sword like shape, and she broke the mirror. She placed a shard of mirror on the goblet, and the goblet and gem fused making a storm roll in. The moons had no light, and the clouds blocked out the sun, or what part was left. It all went dark. Only Lhyna was seen.
Lhyna and Lantorn. Lantorn came up behind Lhyna. Lhyna said, "Time I finish this, once and for all." The sword formed before her and she stuck in into the key slot.
Vanos struggled up. He was injured from the fall, but he crawled to Lhyna. Some others crawled, and Lhyna opened her eyes.
"My power is to force you all to sleep," Lhyna said. A beam of purple shot from the moon and filled into Lhyna. Electricity coursed around her.
The beam broke parts around the sword, and Lhyna released a beam from herself that ravaged the crowd. All of them fell to sleep.
It was not a death beam. It was only a night night beam. That was what Lhyna called it for fun. She felt herself glowing yellow, as part of her tried to fight back. She shook her head.
She bit down on Mynt's nape and dragged her over, before seeing Lantorn. "I guess you're here too." Lantorn nodded.
Arber came from the rubble, having hid behind a boulder. He took a deep breath, and placed his hand on the sword. Lantorn did too.
Lhyna shoved Mynt onto the temple and their vines crossed into the temple door, opening it. A light shined from within it.
"You have all fought well," Lhyna said. She gazed at the sleeping bodies. "Now the Eater of Planets will come within five minutes."
Lantorn said, "About that, Lhyna, I need to talk to you." Lhyna nodded, and paced around the entrance, while the being formed.
Lhyna said, "You are right, we have won." She grinned and laughed. "I have finished my purpose in the scheme of fixing the world."
Lantorn said, "When you met her, you changed." Lhyna's grin faded as she heard Lantorn speak. Lantorn paced around Lhyna. "You and I. You had saved me, and made me feel good. Now I know you are a monster, who has lost yourself."
Lhyna said, "Too late, I have done it all. I know, you feel like being a goddess. Take your sword, and walk away." She ripped the sword out and threw it at Lantorn. Lantorn ducked it, and Arber grabbed it instead.
"I will be taking all the power," Lantorn said. "The sword, the three traits, the control of the Eater of Planets. This can only happen if I take back my power."
Lhyna backed up, as the storm clouds passed, and more light seeped in. "What are you talking about, Lantorn? You and I have the powers of gods."
"You tried to teach me by fear. You made me scared, and you tried to make me live in that fear. Not now, and not again." Lantorn took a step forward. "This world needs no reset, this world is fine, it's the moon that needs a reset."
Lhyna prepared a second beam, and said, "I know what you're thinking. You have always been trying to be better." She launched the beam, but Arber charged in front of Lantorn. He swung the sword and twirled it to absorb the beam.
Lantorn stepped around the boh. "I agree with the idea of ruling Wysdom. I will rule Wysdom. You tried too hard to go for a cause because you forgot about it. You are only doing this to please her."
Lhyna growled and said, "Lantorn, stop saying stuff that's untrue, okay?" She felt sweat dripping down. "I am a good person."
"You fought to save nature at one point," Lantorn said. "You fought to make sure we all praised and knew about the Ascended and their order? That was the goal, and you lost your mind. You became the trait of Fear."
Lhyna shot a third beam, but Arber got in the way again, deflecting it with his sword. The sword crackled in his grasp. Lhyna began hyperventilating.
"You are the coward and you are afraid of being forgot, and losing your power. That's what this is about. You feel like a reset will force all to think about the Ascended as their gods. You think you can teach wolves to worship you again. But that is wrong, Lhyna, as you are no hero. I am the hero. They will all fear me now." Lhyna felt afraid again.
"Broken"
We are crashing and burning
We are fighting and losing
The war rages like the fire
Burning that should ignite us
Instead fire incites us
Dying could have designed us
To never think about it again, until this day
To take the pain away
We are standing and raging
We are crawling and falling
Bring it on and break it
Breeze past, take it and break it
Thinking it's brinking I'm broken
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