“I have so many questions…” Kayel muttered to himself as they reached their target. Normally universes were surrounded with a black, inky substance known as Vastskin, that kept the universe in and the void out. But this universe’s Vastskin was solid and diamond-coloured.
“Why have you not been asking them then?” Elkay-En asked.
“Because I am annoying and Skyavok-y and ask a lot of questions and also I was kinda hoping the old All-Ksa would ask questions first so I wouldn’t seem so rude?” Kayel glanced at someone who was essentially his own boss. Being a former Phantasma soldier, part of Kayel’s oaths included serving the Shadow without question.
“I’ve got a loooong list of questions, but I’m waiting until this mess is over. Although, Litty, kid, you’ve got questions too.”
Little Litvir hadn’t really been paying attention. They had never seen the universe from this angle before and were somewhat mesmerised by it. But at the same time, their questions were far more awkward and involved not looking at the strong, muscular Rethan with wings who was piloting the ship.
Realising Litvir wasn’t going to answer, Kayel decided to just start asking questions.
“So, uh, how are we not going to affect the universe once we step inside? Also, has that metal plate always been there?”
“I suppose, in the same way that Litvir and I are not affected by the void outside the universe?” the Shadow suggested, pointing at a wristband he was wearing. On further inspection, it wasn’t a wristband, it was a tendril of flesh, wrapped around his arm.
“Hm…” Elkay-En inspected the tendril, then created a handful of similar-looking but… messier tendrils, which he then handed to everyone. “Since I am Epani’s sibling, perhaps my own tendrils will give you all a similar protection? And if we all wear them, then Rethan Elkay has something he can track, to make sure he doesn’t accidentally time-freeze us.”
“Can you make a bunch?” Shadow Elkay asked. “I can put them on my fellow Twelve Anew to un-freeze them and then they can assist us in the fight.”
“Of course…” Elkay-En made a large amount of them, placed them in a bag of flesh he also made and handed the bag to Shadow Elkay. The sound of all of that though distracted Litvir enough to turn around and properly acknowledge Elkay-En.
“Can I ask a question please?” Litvir asked. “Are you really the big sibling of the big snake and Kyr Epani?”
“I am, yes. Half-sibling, technically.”
“But you also smell a bit like very nice Kyr big Elkay here.”
“I am not that big…” Rethan Elkay muttered.
“You are not? You are normal size for a Rethan.”
Rethan Elkay decided not to answer, and instead got everyone focused. “Alright, we have arrived. Sini will wait for us outside. Shadow Elkay, you and Litvir will need to enter first, as a distraction, then lead us to where Kairos is. I somewhat need visual before I can start altering threads, but once I have it, you can all get to work… I assume removing the Corruption from Kairos?”
“That works…”
The ship came to a halt. Sini had been sitting on top of it, and she anchored the ship to the little metal hatch, before opening the door.
“Get yourselves moving. Now.”
The collection of Elkays (and one baby Litvir) did as they were told. Litvir stepped into the universe first, checked to make sure there was no Corruption nearby, then helped everyone inside.
“Nice place…” Elkay-En smiled a little.
Shadow Elkay tutted. “Thanks. Could be better though… Everyone please hold my hand so I can use the convenient shadow I have here to get to the library.”
Again, everyone did as they were told. Their surroundings changed and they appeared in a diamond-coated library of some sort. Despite at least 24 hours having passed, most beings in the room were as they left them. Except for two: Kairos and Epani. While they were moving in slow motion, Kairos was very gradually pinning Epani down and trying to infect her with the Corruption that was climbing up his body.
Immediately, the Synaisthyn got to work, closing his eyes briefly and mimicking foreign Time Drake abilities. Although they were invisible to the average being, and to everyone else present, Elkay mostly seemed to just be waving his hands. But he was in fact tangling Kairos up in a myriad of different time threads, so many that Kairos could no longer see into the future. Not because his powers were turned off, but because Elkay was creating so many alternate future timelines that Kairos was simply overwhelmed by them.
At the same time, Elkay-En was drawing Kairos’s attention away from Epani, while Shadow Elkay and Litvir did their best to try and move Epani away. While Kairos didn’t care at first, as he caught wind of Elkay-En’s scent, he growled and focused on him.
“What… what are you?”
“Ah… you…”
That voice was both Kairos’s and not Kairos’s. Kinisis’s corrupted voice echoed underneath Kairos’s.
“I, unfortunately, am the first child of Kinisis…” Elkay-En snarled as he summoned meaty tendrils, wrapping them around Kairos’s wings in order to stop him from getting airborne. “And I am disappointed that you decided to give yourself to the horrific entity that calls itself Kinisis, rather than, I don’t know, just being a decent person and being nice to one of her four perfectly normal and nice daughters.”
Kairos snarled, struggling with great fury. Elkay-En’s meat tendrils were struggling to keep Kairos bound.
“You are all just pathetic mirrors of me… of Kinisis!”
“She is just using and abusing you. Same way she used and abused everyone else. And now she is overwhelming you.”
But Kairos was suddenly overwhelmed by something else. The Twelve Anew had started moving normally as well. While Rethan Elkay entangled the corrupted Whenvern on the temporal plane, Kayel had sneaked around, placing Elkay-En’s protective wristbands on the younger deities, enabling them to move. And they swiftly got to work, helping the Elkays keep Kairos chained down, while the smaller members started moving people away, as there were still innocent folks trapped within the area. Kayel remained sneaking around, putting more wristbands on trapped folks, so the Twelve Anew could rescue and move them.
“You are letting them win…” a voice echoed.
“I AM NOT!” Kairos roared, spitting fire, only for the flames to be put out by one of the Twelve Anew, probably Valksia with her water powers. Dalosisaar used this as a distraction to move Epani out of the conflict, since she was definitely hurt, and Syksis got to work fixing up Epani’s injuries and making sure she wasn’t Corrupted.
“They are defeating you. Let me take over.”
“YOU SAID WE WOULD BE TOGETHER.”
“You said you were stronger.”
“YOU SAID-”
Before Kairos could finish his sentence, the Corruption covering his body completely took over, surrounding him and changing him. He began to flail wildly, shaking off Elkay-En’s tendrils and creating horrible, inky tendrils of his own, which Kairos used to throw people around. All the while, time was beginning to slow down again.
“Rethan Elkay, you need to do something!” Elkay-En hissed as he ducked for cover and tried to regain control.
“I am!” Elkay snarled.
“Me too!”
Kayel remained quirky as his eyes began to glow the same way Elkay’s eyes did. He pressed himself against Elkay’s back and, despite having no idea what he was doing, began to bolster the Syniasthyn’s mimicked time powers. This seemed to at least keep Kairos from corrupting the Forward Flow completely. And it gave a chance for Litvir and Murum’Va to start burning the Corruption off Kairos’s body properly.
For a brief moment, Kairos regained control of himself, pushing Kinisis back and out of his head. However, his statement wasn’t what anyone wanted to hear.
“Fine. I realise now I never needed any of you. So I’ll just dismantle the Forward Flow and leave you all to freeze. And I think I am going to start with killing all you stupid Elkays.”
With a low, echoing growl, Kairos purged Kinisis from himself, allowing the Twelve Anew to destroy the Corruption. But he then immediately turned against them, throwing the young Rethan and the flaming Banikan out and away from the conflict, into another, nearby room.
However, before Kairos could do much else, he heard a new growl. One that made little sense and didn’t belong to any of the deities present.
“YOU HURT THEM!”
Kairos blinked, then wished he hadn’t.