The Eternal Wanderer sped away from Krynn at speeds the crew could never think were possible. They nearly lost part of the main shell during the liftoff; Hall agreed to use a new booster device Zebart designed. It worked...barely.
Onboard, Damian Josh sat at the helm. The drow elf looked tired; his shift was not due to start yet and he barely had enough chance to study some spells before being called to the helm. He, like the rest of the crew, didn't care about their own well being. The safety and health of their captain was paramount.
Hall sat in the captain's chair, while Li'Tsing checked over the stellar maps looking for the shortest route to a portal. Meridian the Kenku stood nearby, not looking over the maps but instead chose to question Hall's decision.
"Foolish," Meridian said to no one in particular.
"I heard that," Hall replied, spinning the captain's chair around to face him. "There is still a chance to save him."
"Too far." Meridian was known for saying very little, a trait that occasionally infuriated Hall.
"Damn! That's your friend out there too! He knew you long and saved your wings more times that you can count! Are you so willing to give up on him! What are you going to do!"
"Mourn him." Meridian leapt over the railing and glided down to the main deck, far below. Belieth watched all that was happening from nearby, worried over her husband. Before they were separated many years past, they knew each other's souls more intimately than any others. They shared a sort of empathy...something that bound them tighter than any chain.
"Hall, I think we need to talk," Belieth said.
Hall rolled his eyes. "Talk. That's what everybody on this ship has been doing the last few days. Talking. The time for talking is over. We have to do something."
"Hall, over the past few days, there have been times when you have been right and I have been right. We're argued, discussed, planned, squabbled, and almost bitterly feuded over this. We have, at one time or another, came to the same conclusion. Onestar is beyond our help. We have to let him go."
Hall just let his face fall into his hands. He stood, turned to Belieth, and just held her. Tears began to flow freely.
"I guess there's nothing I can do to save him," Hall sobbed.
"Would it help if I told you that I feel your pain. I mean, I really feel your pain?"
Hall looked at her, and began to feel something within him also. "You don't mean...the bond?" Belieth just nodded. Hall wept more then, but more of joy and not of sadness.
"It's just started, but I can feel it, my darling," Belieth said. Hall let her go, wiped his eyes, and sat back down in the chair again.
"Damian," Hall spoke knowing the drow could hear him, "don't overexert yourself. Just get us to the shell the best you can. There is nothing we can do for him, but I will be in Omnispace. At least I can avenge him. Or perhaps just bury him."
The hordlings poured from the shadows with such speed and force that Onestar was almost knocked off his feet by their numbers. He began swinging, knowing that he would hit a target.
These were creatures from the planes, Onestar knew, that were the grunt forces for Planar Daemons. He assumed that Scillabba gated them here, but how could he, a minor daemon at best, get so many in one place at one time?
The samurai had no time for thoughts. Creatures with two, three and four arms, multiple heads and legs. Most of them just attacked with clawed hands, but a few had hooks, spears and other weapons on their limbs. Onestar lost count of the number present. He fought, slicing through each one of them while they clawed him to pieces.
One took a bite from his leg. Another clawed at his head. While most of him was protected by his armor, there were vulnerable points the creatures found. After what seemed to be hours, Onestar stood, bloodied, bruised but not beaten, the creatures bodies strew around him.
As the samurai stood there, trying to catch his breath, a voice could be heard booming from in front of him.
[Excellent, little samurai! Excellent! I'm truly surprised. I thought the wretches would be the death of you.]
Onestar began moving again, running toward a door north of his position. Beyond it was the glow of an inhuman fire. He stopped, looked through carefully, then put his blade through the archway first. It crackled as it passed an invisible barrier.
[Very good, samurai! Very good. You're actually getting better at finding those traps...some of Vlasic's thief skills might be rubbing off on you.]
Onestar closed his eyes and concentrated on the far side of the portal. Although he was tired, his body hurt and his head throbbed with pain, he somehow managed to find the strength to focus. With a thought, he disappeared, only to reappear on the other side of the archway.
[TELEPORTATION!] Scillabba cried in shock. [When did you learn that trick?]
"I've grown since we last fought monster," Onestar said. His voice was raspy. He began to look even more tired.
[So it would appear,] Scillabba replied. [I learned much about you while I was in hell, but not enough. I heard that your god gave you many gifts as a child, gifts you would need someday.]
Onestar heard his taunts, but ignored them as he ran on.
[Ah, the things I've seen about you. If only you could remember those times on Sphereworld... but you can't, can you. You only remember up to when you left your shogun to travel and learn all you could. You don't remember the others, do you?]
Onestar stopped, gasping for breath, forcing himself not to listen.
[What about the time you, barely a cub, fought the mind flayer toe-to-toe... and won! I saw that. I also know how you lost your memory. Would you like to know that?]
The samurai once more, headed in an all-too familiar direction.
[I know how you died, I know how you died.] Scillabba was openly taunting Onestar now, rhyming a children's verse with the words changed. Onestar recognized this path before...it was the way he and Scillabba fought years past to reach the chamber his armor rested in. There was only one more door, and beyond...
Onestar reached it, out of breath and tired. He threw it open and looked within.
It was the throne room where the armor was stored before, all right. About as large as Onestar's quarters on the Wanderer, it was aglow with torches resting in gold-relief scones. Scillabba sat on a bronze throne toward the rear wall, with Crystal magically suspended to his right. The samurai took a quick look in her direction to make sure she was fine. She met his eyes and smiled briefly, although in obvious pain from the magical binds that tied her.
Scillabba sat cross-legged, hands folded on his lap. His beastly eyes stared toward the samurai unblinking. Neither moved for a moment, then Scillabba stood and walked to the center of the chamber. Onestar lunged for the creature, but stopped short. Scillabba waved his hand and an image formed before the samurai. It was a chamber, cold dark stone, buried far underground. Not very large, there was a warrior with Eastern features standing in muck and filth. Hanging from his head were nine crystal globes.
After staring at the image, Onestar realized that the warrior was indeed himself, but could not place the location. The sword hummed, and the globes, all nine, shattered as one. From each, deadly oozes, puddings and jellies flowed. Onestar tried to fight them, but suddenly grabbed his head in pain. They poured over him, attacking him even as stopped them. With one last swing, he stopped moving.
"You fell in battle, samurai. You died on Sphereworld. You died in a battle, separated from all those who knew you Onestar."
Scillabba's words had little impact on Onestar, since his mind never turned from the images floating between the pair. How Onestar left Sphereworld was always a mystery...none had ever left the sealed world. Now, this new information was given, and Onestar knew it to be true...but also opened more questions the samurai could not answer.
"This is a lie!" Onestar screamed.
"This is the truth, and you know it," Scillabba replied. "You perished on Sphereworld, was taken to Gehenna, and then sent back to this plane for reasons that I have yet to determine. But I do know that you are another servant of the darkness, Onestar. Just as I am."
Onestar reeled. After the battles with the hordlings, the fall from the palace above and the need to teleport, Onestar was tired, physically and mentally. He wasn't thinking clearly. He looked back at the now-fading image of him lying there, in an obvious trap among filth and muck, a broken man.
"How...how..."
"How did you get there?" Scillabba answered. "From what I have been able to gather, the party you were traveling with learned that you weren't the honorable creature you pretended to be. They tricked you into entering this trapped chamber and left you to die, atemetois perioqui. A vagabond without honor."
Onestar looked back to Scillabba and glared. He raised his swords toward the creature and advanced. "I have been many things, but I have always had my honor! Without that, I am nothing!"
Scillabba backed away slowly. "This is no lie I am telling you. You surely feel that? All that you have seen happened. This, I learned from a daemon in exchange for a few souls I was in charge of."
Onestar backed away, lowering his blades. "If this is true, and I... sense it is...then I have been living a lie. If I am not a being of honor... then I have no reason to live." Onestar backed away to a corner of the room. For a second, he looked up to Crystal, then turned his head. Awhile back, aboard the Eternal Wanderer, he thought there might have been some...feeling between the two of them. Now, since he learned he was not the honorable being he knew, there was no hope for that now.
"Onestar," Scillabba said, now resting one hand on his shoulder, "now that you know the truth, there is no reason for us to fight. Join me, and together, we can rule this sphere! We are two of a kind, you know. Both of us dedicated to the cause we serve. Imagine what we can accomplish...the worlds will shake and the heavens (if you'll pardon the expression) will fall!"
Onestar walked away from Scillabba. His wounds were making him tired, he couldn't think straight...what would he do if he didn't have his honor? No honor...no life...no reason to...
Onestar turned back and faced Scillabba, and in the distance, Crystal. He bowed to her, a most formal and distinct bow. His eyes met hers for a minute. As he looked into her eyes, he could see pain, but he could not get past his own. Onestar had to force himself to look away from her.
The samurai then turned back and faced Scillabba. Saying nothing, Onestar instead knelt down and took his wakizashi, his famed short sword, and held it in his right hand, the blade pointing to himself. His armor changed into a simple, white kimono.
"Onestar, what are you doing?" Scillabba asked.
"I have no honor, then I have no right to live. Farewell. Good-bye."
Crystal shrieked and thrashed against the magical bonds which held her. Scillabba just stood there, wringing his hands, waiting for the samurai to finish himself. Onestar rested his head for one second, then began to thrust the blade into his stomach. It pierced his skin, a trickle of blood began to roll down him, then....
The blade disappeared!
Scillabba's eyes widened in horror. He watched as Onestar plunged the handle toward his stomach, but no blade was attached to it. He staggered back into the magical field that held Crystal fast. As he touched it, it flared, throwing him into another corner of the room. Even as he flew, the magical aura dissipated from Crystal. She ran over to Onestar's side, holding the still-kneeling samurai.
Scillabba shook his head. The magical prison he constructed to hold Crystal had staggered the monster enough to make the room spin and his head ache, but little more. He stood, blinked his eyes several times and tried to focus on Onestar. Within a minute, he was able to see the samurai and the elven bard well enough to charge him.
"Enough!" Scillabba roared. "If I couldn't convince you to kill yourself, then I'll have to do the job myself!"
"I don't think so."
Scillabba stopped in his tracks. This voice, a deep rich baritone, surprised him. "Who said that?"
"I did." Slowly, a humanoid figure wearing midnight blue body armor materialized between Onestar, Crystal and Scillabba. His visored face stared right into Scillabba's eyes.
"LORD MONITOR!" Scillabba cried out. "What in the seven hells are you doing here!"
"Scillabba?" Lord Monitor replied, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "I hardly recognized you. I must say, this is an improvement."
"Don't mock me, magi," Scillabba roared. After he spoke, Scillabba inhaled. Fire poured from his nostrils when he exhaled, striking Lord Monitor full in the chest. The magi just yawned.
"Is that the best you can do?" Monitor replied, then snapped his fingers. Suddenly, the fire spewing forth turned to solid ice, freezing the monster.
"That will only hold him for a few minutes," Lord Monitor said, turning to face Onestar and Crystal. "But for now, I've a few other problems." He looked down at the battered samurai. "How are you, son?"
"Lo...Lo...Lord Monitor?" Onestar replied, bruises now beginning to form on the warrior.
"Sir? Who are you?" Crystal asked.
"I might ask the same as you, child."
"I am Crystal Ravenheart, child of the Ravenheart clan from Realmspace. I am a navigator on the Eternal Wanderer."
"Ah," Lord Monitor said. "Then you're a part of Onestar's crew. But something tells me there's more here than meets the eye, if you'll pardon the expression."
"Lord Monitor," Onestar said, trying to stand, his voice barely a whisper, "how did you get here? Why are you here?"
"I sensed that someone was using a magical item I created, and that person was nearby. I decided to go for a stroll. Now then, son, what are you doing here?"
"Came to fight Scillabba...but learned something..."
"He's seriously injured," Crystal said, holding the samurai gently. "Scillabba showed him images from his past."
"Really," Lord Monitor said. "This I must see..." The Magi then placed one hand on the samurai's forehead, and paused. After a few seconds, he removed it with a shock. "He knows...this is not good."
"Then it is true?" Crystal asked, almost fearful of the answer. "Did Onestar die without honor?"
"No. Onestar was led into the trap by the others in that party. They were the dishonorable ones. My old friend is the most honorable man I know. But he did die on Sphereworld."
"Do you know what happened to him, sir?" Crystal asked, hoping... There was a long pause before Lord Monitor responded.
"Tell me, child, are you a healer?"
"No, sir," Crystal replied, a look of puzzlement on her face. "I am a bard."
"Oh, well, looks like I have to rely on a couple old tricks I know. Onestar. Onestar. Wake up, m'boy! C'mon! Up and at 'em!"
The Magi slapped Onestar a few times before the samurai reached out and caught his attacker's hand.
"I do hate it when you do that," Onestar replied, conscious but in obvious pain.
"Well, it's like this," Lord Monitor replied, a thin smile on his lips. "Either you wake up and take care of Scillabba, or else we're all gonna get it."
"Why me? You're the all-powerful magi. You deal with him."
"That's the easy way out, Onestar. Have you ever known me to let you do the easy thing?"
Onestar grimaced at Lord Monitor, then took to his feet. "No."
"Good!" Monitor replied, clapping his hands together. "Then go get him. That ice should melt just...about...now!"
As if on cue, the ice covering Scillabba disintegrated and the monster howled in rage. Onestar leapt at the demon with a renewed fury. Both of the samurai's blades were where they belonged, and he used both of them on Scillabba.
Onestar attacked without quarter, never giving Scillabba a chance to stand and defend himself. Blows were delivered to the creature to every part of his body. The samurai swung, cutting into the creature then having the wounds heal afterward. With each slice, Scillabba howled in pain.
"Y'see," Lord Monitor began, after moving Crystal off to one side, "those blades allow the user to attack creatures with normal magical resistance. The creature is cut, but while the wound heals magically, the wound is...infected with magic. The pain can get quite unbearable. With each cut, the creatures resistance to magic is lowered slightly until the blades will harm it normally. Really great for pesky buggers."
"But what happened to the shorter blade?" Crystal asked. "It disappeared when Onestar tried to kill himself?"
"I placed a protective spell against it. Should he ever use the swords against him, or anyone else attempt to harm him with it, the blades just disappear. Never figured where to, however."
"You created the swords, but you don't know what happens to them?"
"That's the beauty of magic, isn't it? The mystery."
Meanwhile, Onestar was still attacking Scillabba, but no longer with just the swords. He was using his martial art skills against the creature, keeping him off balance. A well placed kick here, a sword slice there, and Scillabba never had a chance to recover or cast a spell.
"He is...magnificent in action," Crystal said, watching him move.
"Does he know that you love him?" Lord Monitor asked. Crystal bowed her head and blushed. "I know that young man better than you may think. He's had a world of hurt on his shoulders since I met him. Onestar is the type of man who would never allow himself to love, unless someone kicked him in the ass and told him they loved him. He thinks all he needs is his honor...nothing more. If you don't tell him how you feel...well, you know."
Onestar by this time had Scillabba down on the ground. His magical resistance all but depleted, Scillabba was bleeding from many wounds. Onestar stood above him, his katana high above his head, ready to deliver the killing blow. With a war cry on his lips, the sword came down...
Right beside Scillabba's head. The monster's eyes were closed, but when he knew he was still alive, Scillabba looked, first at the blade just from his face, then up at Onestar, looking down at him.
"I do not have the right to kill you," he said. "It would not be... honorable. I leave you to your fate." Onestar pulled the sword from the ground and walked over to Lord Monitor, turning his back on the creature. Scillabba started to stand, but the ground beneath began to glow. Suddenly, the earth opened and Scillabba disappeared in a mix of fire and smoke. All that could be heard was his screams of agony as the floor fixed itself.
The three remaining just watched as the earth healed. Onestar sheathed his katana and wakizashi, then collapsed to the ground. Crystal ran to his side and stroked his face.
"Looks like I better send you to someone who can help," Lord Monitor said.
"Lord Monitor," Onestar said, his voice less than before. "Farewell."
"I shall see you soon, samurai." Lord Monitor looked down onto Onestar and Crystal.
"I...shall never...again enter Omnispace," Onestar replied. Lord Monitor waved his hand over the pair and they faded from sight.
"I shall see you soon, samurai." Lord Monitor's voice was grave and deep. Seconds later, the room was empty.
"Flow Stations!" Meridian cried. All hands onboard the Eternal Wanderer moved in precision to extinguish all flames. The ship had made excellent time to the spherewall; they would be leaving Krynnspace in two minutes.
Hall sat on the helm, while Blaise sat in the captain's chair several decks above. Belieth was next to Blaise, ready to cast the spell to open a hole into the flow.
There was no flash of light, no muffled sounds, no warning as Crystal Ravenheart and Onestar appeared on the main deck of the Eternal Wanderer, just feet from where Hall was sitting. Hall supressed every urge to jump from that helm and grab his old friend. Instead, his cry of "ONESTAR" rang throughout the ship, causing many of the crew to rush up on deck.
As Phantom, Ville, Kath, and others gathered around, Onestar opened his eyes slightly. He looked around, seeing the smiling faces and felt the familiar feel of the Wanderer moving at high speeds. He felt a shift as the vessel passed safely into the flow, and sensed everyone's happiness.
"What?" Onestar said, his voice barely a whisper, "hasn't anyone ever seen a man teleported before? Return to your stations. But, if it isn't too much trouble, could someone get me a doctor?"
Finally clear of the sphere, (and since a refreshed Damian was there to take over for him) Hall leapt from the helm and grabbed his friend, embracing him.
"Not too tight, Hall," Onestar whispered. "Not too many of the pieces are where the belong."
"Oh, shut up, you old fool!" Hall lifted Onestar up (somehow) and carried him below deck.
A week later, in the flow...
"...so you think Scillabba was taken back to Gehenna?"
"It appeared that way. I think if I ever see him again, he won't be quite as powerful."
Onestar was sitting up in bed, with Hall and Belieth sitting near him. Father Armas said that the samurai was fairly badly beaten...Onestar slept for three days and was taking healing potions for the next four before finally allowing Hall to visit.
The ship was on its way to the Rock of Bral, since Blaise had an appointment to keep. Also, they had to pick up an old friend.
"I'd like to know how he was able to pull you across the spheres like that," Hall commented. "I've been in the library for a week now, and I still can't figure out how he did it."
"Odds are, that's another mystery we'll never solve," Belieth replied.
"I think I'd rather not know," Onestar added. "I learned too many things on this trip I didn't know before. I have more questions than answers."
"To think," Hall began, "you died. That was the only way to get off of Sphereworld. But why were you sent here? What mission did your god have for you here?"
Onestar just arched an eyebrow.
[Prepare for Shift change. Alpha Shift, report to your stations.] The voice seemed to come from Onestar's medical wraps.
"That means I have to get to the bridge," Hall commented. "Belieth's been filling in for you on your shifts in the chair, Onestar. Do you mind?"
"Of course not. You are part of this crew, aren't you?"
Belieth nodded and smiled. A knock came to the door.
"Enter," Onestar said. The door opened and Crystal stood there, looking much better than she had a week ago. Her hair was combed straight, and she wore a beautiful white gown.
"Un, we, uh, have to go," Hall said.
"Yeah," Belieth added. "have to go. Bye."
Crystal passed them as she entered. Hall smiled slightly as he walked past her. Onestar motioned for her to come in and sit down.
"Onestar," Crystal began, a smile on her slight lips. She also took his hand. "We have to talk."
The samurai returned her smile and took her hand in his other.
The End.
