Starchild

Chapter one: Titan Overture

Ages ago, I was once normal, an average Joe. I worked nine to five, ate
Cheetos and lived in a two bedroom apartment alone. Then came that day, the day I
left it all behind. That day I met the thing that called itself Ares.

That day started out like any other day: get up, get dressed, get to work.
Back then I worked at an office, was an engineer of sorts. I was paid to buy things
from other companies, take them apart, and put them back together better than
before. That day was also the day I got sacked. They said things about efficiency,
about how I was productive but not as much of a team player as they needed. They
gave me all of that day to finish what I had been working on and to pack up my
stuff. I couldn't argue, I was in no place or position to argue, so I just bit down
and accepted it. Feeling pretty crappy and with nothing to lose, I asked Darla from
accounting out, thinking �it's not like this day could get any worse�. Feeling as
in the gutter as I was, I had to do a double take when she said yes. It seemed
earlier that day she also got bumped for someone a little bit more �into it� and
was actually thinking of asking me out for dinner to celebrate our horrible luck in
life. We made plans for a little place down the road at 8:00, grabbed our
belongings from our desks and left.

I was on my way home from the last day at my dead-end job, stuck in rush-hour
traffic. I was sitting in my car, a little pumped that something went right that
day, trying to pass the time with some music, inching ahead slowly as the hour
passed, when I heard a massive crash from behind me. Getting out of the car, a bit
spooked, I went to go check on things and saw I wasn�t the only one with the idea.
Down the road I saw a bit of smoke and saw people gathering, and I figured that�s
where the crash came from. When I got to where the smoke was originating, I saw
that it came from the wreck of one car crushed on top the other, like a car
sandwich without the meat. After a closer look, I lost my lunch and scratched that
�without the meat� part. Then, as if on queue, a flaming car came crashing down
behind me.

I, like everyone else, was running like a madman. Dodging cars as they fell, just
trying to get away, I finally started to notice the thumping. Thinking back on it,
I may have caught it beforehand, just thinking it was some gangster kid with his
sub-woofer on too high, but it was very apparent now. It was like a very long and
slow heartbeat, but strong enough to feel in your feet. Looking up to see where all
the cars where coming from, now being shaken by the progressively louder and louder
thump, I finally found the source of it all, I finally saw it.

It was raining at the time, and clouds still covered the sky, but I could
still see it. To say that it was bigger than anything I have ever seen before would
almost be insulting it, as it was so big that while walking on the ground, it�s
upper portions were still lost far above the blanket of clouds. From my view point
I could make out around four to six legs on the thing�s lower half, and for the
most part was insectoid, save that it�s tail was like a colossal whip, and it�s
legs terminated in cross shaped feet with hoof like claws. It must have been three
miles away, yet I still had to look up to see it�s lower half, and movements in the
clouds suggested that the rest of it was already overhead. I have never been more
terrified, not only of the monster before me, but also of how powerless I, and
everyone else, was against such a thing.

There was a massive flash before me, and I was blinded for a second. To my
front was what appeared to be a solid disk of electricity, standing vertically and
with its flat side facing me. I could hear faint things in the disk, ��you
sure�one�� and ��hope�late�� were a couple. With another large, loud thump I was
reminded of my situation. I could make out tiny details of its upper half now, as
the clouds were lightening up a bit. I could see four little limbs on a slender
body, with two long stump-like shapes behind it. Then the clouds parted overhead
and I wished they hadn�t. its face was as hideous as it was massive, A chitinous
sphere ending in ten tentacles, which surrounded it�s gaping maw.

The stumps on it�s back began to spread, and I knew they could only be wings.
They grew and grew until they seemed to cover up the sky, and the thing began to
pull them up. The voices beyond the disk were louder now, and two different voices
could be defined. The first was very masculine and doubtful, saying �Are you sure
we have the right one?�, the second voice sounded like it couldn�t care less,
saying �won�t know till we check�. I cannot remember anything too in-depth as to
what they were talking about then as the colossal monster, wings outstretched, bore
down on me, as if it could see something so small by comparison. Those horrid
titanic whips that stemmed from it�s mouth spread forth, breaking the sound barrier
with malicious intent, going straight for me, when I felt a �tug�. With an
earthshaking scream the entire beast shot down after me as I was pulled backward
through the disk with enough force to knock the wind out of me. My last sight of
the place I had once been was a massive orange radiance flying into that thing�s
city-sized maw.

Chapter two: A Thing Named Ares.

It took me forever to realize I was no longer on earth.

I woke up in a strange place, with the worst headache I have ever felt, and
took a long look around. I was in the middle of a forest of some sort, on what
looked like an Aztec pyramid. The trees moved to and fro, and the sky was a strange
colour of red.

�Well hello there, welcome to Kriegsland, how�s the portal hangover?�

�what?� I questioned the strange carefree voice from nowhere, �Who are you?
Where are you?�

�Ahaha, Who? Well I guess I must�ve gone by thousands of names and titles
over the eons. For now my fine young� subject,� the man said, revealing himself,
�you may call me Ares.�

The man, if you could call him that, was tall to say the least. He stood
before me at around nine feet tall, but could have been much taller as he stood
with a bit of a slouch. He wore a long dark gray or dull black trench coat, a wide
brimmed hat and white gloves. Right off the bat I could tell he wasn�t human, he
had the vague outline of one, but the proportions were all awry. His entire body
was slender; his upper arms were short and thin, while his forearms were massive
and triangular, with huge three fingered hands at their ends. His legs were very
strange, but where also very hard to see, as they were almost always hidden by his
coat. They looked like the legs you�d expect on a dinosaur, long and with two bends
in them, and the feet just seemed unrealistic, having two large blunt hook-like
claws and two little sharp claws each. Lastly was that face of his, even now I
don�t know how to react to it. It had very few features to it, but those features
seemed to dominate his entire head. He had no nose, nor ears, but had two massive
curved milky eyes and a mouth large and bent in such a way that you couldn�t tell
if he was smiling or if it was just the way his face was built.

�I understand you�ve seen an unbelievably large amount of weird things today,

no?�

�What was that thing, am I dreaming, is this a nightmare?� I said.

 �Ha, no son, no no no no no, you�re just stuck in a situation that you cannot
control.�

�Am I dead, is this hell?�

�BAHAHAHAHA,� he laughed �oh that�s funny; you�re not the first to call it
that, no, but it is no place of religious texts. This is a sanctuary, a haven, for
the underdog my boy. This is where mice are made into monsters and men into gods!
Come young man, let us walk a little, talk a little, and get to know each other a
bit better.�
As we walked about this �Kriegsland�, Ares told me as much as he deemed my
brain capable of. He told that the creature I had seen was an �Old One�, an
organism born in my dimension but not meant for it. He summarized them as my
universes �first, greatest, and most violent attempt at life�. He said that for
more than less universes the Old Ones are works of fiction, plot devices and
characters for horror writers and movie makers, but for some they do happen to be a
�beautiful yet cruel reality�. I had an idea of what he meant, and it made me feel
a little uneasy.

He also told me about himself, how even he was human at one point in time. He
told me how he discovered a loophole in physics, called it �concentrated
evolution�, where if something were to apply this loophole, they could be able to
produce PI Kilojoules of energy for every Joule consumed. I told him that was WAY
over my head and he said this didn�t surprise him. He then told me about this
world, this �Kriegsland�. He said that he made this world from nothing and almost
every day goes around other realities, takes what he deems worthy of living here,
and brings them back, in an attempt to further his research of his loophole and
apply it to those deserving, maintaining a sort of �constant evolution of single
generations�.

Around this point I realized that this Ares was the second voice from what I
knew now to be a dimensional portal. I wondered where the first voice had gone, and
I asked Ares as such. Ares said that I had actually been out of commission for
around three days, and that �Pyron� had gone to train his little volcanic beasts.
Then he just up and called Pyron over.

�HEY PYRON, GET YER SOLAR ASS OVER HERE, WE HAVE A GUEST!�

There was a brilliant blue flash that shot across the sky before us. It then
changed direction and fell down to us at speeds that I thought it would hit us at
if it continued, but just before hitting us it just stopped. The sapphire sphere
before us changed all the way through the gradient levels to orange, than began to
change shape. He was almost too bright to look at, as if he was a miniature sun,
but I managed to watch him alter his form. First came the hands, then the arms,
legs torso and head, which sprouted two very long and unnatural looking horns
sprouting from its sides. Before me stood Pyron, the being who would be my new
mentor for the next five years.

Chapter three: Pandemonium

�This is it? This is what you give me to work with? You must be joking!�

The walking talking miniature sun that was the being Pyron showed absolutely
no signs of being impressed.

�Hey now Pyron, you got what you asked for, you know the drill. Now, finish
what you start.�

�Are you positively sure Ares? The kid comes from a world destined to be
consumed.�
 �Atatatata, No using that �destined� word here remember? And yes I�m sure,
just look at him, kid gots spunk!�

They both looked at me and all I could do in that situation is look down at
my feet. Then they went back to each other.

�Just do it Pyron.�
�Fine, fine, I am in no position to challenge the god of war when he has his
mind made up. HEY KID, COM�ERE!�
I was stuck between a sun and a hard place, so I did what any normal human
being would do in that situation; I obeyed the giant muscular orange man of fire.

�Hey kid, Ares here probably tell you of his little code yet? Bah, of course
he did! Wanna see it?�
He held out his hand and with a flick of his fingers what appeared to be a
fire ball appeared on his thumb. As I looked closer into it, I noticed that a
colour was off; instead of a small section of blue fire in the center it was all
black. I looked even closer I realized that there was no fire there, and that what
were luminescent were extremely tiny math equations and abstract geometries
spiraling together wildly. Pyron flicked his wrist and opened his hand to reveal an
even bigger burning ball of math upon his open palm. I was so mesmerized by the
strange physics flare that I didn�t notice when Pyron pulled back the arm holding
the code and ready it. Pyron was a powerful being you see, and needless to say the
blow sent me flying, the problem was, I didn�t land.

I shot across monster ridden Kriegsland like a giant bullet. The code Pyron
hit me with had turned me into a sphere with some sort of spiral pattern on it,
crunched into fetal position with a strange yellow radiance in front of me. As I
flew through the atmosphere, propelled by that godly slap from the man that was
also a sun, the yellow radiance began to get larger and hotter, more hostile. The
radiance wanted something from me, and in my chaotic train of thought I couldn�t
help but remember my little sister, who had just entered high school. I began to
think of my mother and father at their house up north. I also remembered the
monster, the �Old One�. I remembered what Ares said of them being a �beautiful yet
cruel truth�, and how Pyron said that my world was �Destined to be consumed�, and I
began to wonder what was happening to my loved ones while I remain bound inside a
little ball drifting through space, I began to wonder about Darla. I became
overwhelmed with sadness, but every time I felt sorrow the yellow radiance would
burn hotter, till finally the gloom became rage and I got angry. No, not just
angry, furious.

I became so angry at my helplessness, angry at the undeniable fact that when

I was pulled from my universe I could do nothing to save the ones I cared about
from that horrible fate of annihilation. As my rage grew more and more I began to
lose track of what was the radiance and what was me, until there was no longer a
distinction between the radiance and myself. At this point I could no longer
contain my rage, my desire to rend asunder all that surrounded me that I finally
spread forth my arms and legs, and the spiral shell that once bound me became my
new skin as I gripped the very fabric of space to slow my accent. This did nothing
at all to slow me though, so in frustration I slammed my fists back and let out a
roar so great it shook the universe, sending shock waves through space, cutting
planets in half and obliterating stars.

I was so angry, so filled with rage and power that I could not understand it
nor control it. My blistering orange skin coiled over my radiant yellow core, like
an orange peel could wrap around it�s original contents, covering it but never
quite fitting the right way, coiling down to a single point on my chest where my
true existence could be seen through a hole in the fabric that was my new found
skin. I could not understand the devastation I caused, nor could I grasp what my
new form truly was. I was alone, in space, with all the power in the universe but a
deathly fear of using it. I would have gone mad had Pyron not shown up just then.
Chapter four: Eye Of The Tiger.

�Hey there kid, how's it going?� Pyron said with a mischievous grin, �I could
hear you from the surface of Kriegsland, and that's a light-year and a half of
vacuum your voice powered through. You sure wrecked up the place out here, now
didn't you?�

�What did you do to me? What is this? What is going on?�

As the questions grew in my head, so did my rage.

�Relax kid, you're just going through some changes, getting a new outlook on
life.� Pyron sat down on some invisible surface in front of me. �You're probably
mad at a million and a half different things right now, but that's normal, it's
what the code does to you, but right now you need to calm down, you won't be able
to do anything or save anyone if you destroy everything right now.�

�I don't understand what's happening, or what I'm capable of! Have you looked
around? Have you seen what I can do?!?

�Whoa whoa whoa, simmer down,� which, looking back, was a funny thing for a
man of fire to say, �I have seen what you can do and I know that in cases such as
this we need what Ares calls �The White Room�.

He gave a flick of his wrist and from his hand a white sphere engulfed us. I
found out much later that this �White Room� was a pocket dimension designed to
teach those with power on a level as great as mine how to control and focus it
without damaging the surrounding universe while in a separate time line. And taught
I was, as for what equates to four and a half years I stayed in the White Room,
slowly learning to control my power.

I had EXTREMELY little control of my powers in the beginning, unleashing

devastating cosmic tears in the space around me with the slightest of motion, I had
to learn to focus my power, aim for something small rather than lay waste to
everything around me. The targets started out big, really big, galactic in size, as
my power seemed to let loose every which-way whenever I tried to hit something.
Then we worked our way down as Pyron taught me more and more of how to limit my
power. Slowly, we began to work down to star systems in size, then to stars,
planets, continents, and eventually city sized areas of effect before Pyron decided
it was time to return to the Kriegsland, where I was to be passed on to Ares.

For once after my nearly five-year training session, I saw the stars as they
naturally were once more. Ares was where I had seen him last, upon his pyramid,
waiting for our arrival.

�Back so soon, I thought you had just left?�

�Things needed to be done in the white room, you chose one hell of a good
one�. I had spent several years of time with Pyron, seen his good AND his bad
sides, but never had I seen him give off such a respectful tone when talking. I
began to wonder even more of the thing called Ares.

�White room?!? You fo'reals?!? He actually made god tier and I wasn't there
to see it? Damn, that's the second one today! Oh well, can't be helped.�

The training on Kriegsland was very different from the training in the White
Room, for it did not center on my destructive capabilities, but rather my creative.
This time we started small, sub atomic actually. Ares told me that my body was like
a chaotic mess of hadrons, the particles that make up matter, and that my power was
not an outward force, but a separating one instead. He told me that in order to
create with my power, I would have to use my power on chaos matter, the fabric of
space, in junction with the correct placement of hadrons in order to trick the
universe into thinking that the matter I intended to create was there from the
beginning. I told him I had no idea what he was talking about or what a hadron was,
and he said �Of course you don't stupid, you worked with computers, not chemical
physics�. As stern and watchful as Pyron was, he was nowhere near as much of a dick
as Ares.

After about six months on Kriegsland I was in full control. Things no longer
blew up when I moved, and making things like cities was a breeze. I was ready to go
home. Then I remembered something that I never should have forgotten, I remembered
the monster.

�Ares,� I called, �why were those Old Ones or whatever you called them on my
world?�
�Hng? Oh, yeah. Well my boy, if your universe is one where Old Ones do exist,
which it was, then they were there from the start. They are actually constructed
similarly to yourself, but can only function when enough light and thermal energy
is presented to them by nearby stars. Simple folks where told of this by one of the
Old Ones long ago in the guise of a man, but their brains were too primitive and
they interpreted this as meaning the stars needed to be in the right position, when
in all reality they only needed to be nearby. In most universes with Old Ones, they
aren't supposed to awaken until the traditional earth dating system Friday Dec.21,
2012, but the stars seem to have been in a strange orbit, and enough of them were
nearby for the few Old Ones on your world to rise. I do believe many causes for
this exist, as there are many bodies that can alter the position of the stars, most
of which I have made myself, and this is actually what I suspect may have
happened.�
�Wait wait wait, so you are telling me that because of YOU my world is being
eaten by giant godly horrors?!?�

�There....... could be a slight chance of that, yes. As you see, before I

took you in, I had taken in some you lady from the same city, who seemed downright
pissed with the world when I talked to her. Her name was Delilah or something, I
didn't care to remember, but she had some extensive knowledge of numbers and of
lovecraftian stories. After giving her the code and seeing what power she had, I
told her she was capable of doing whatever she wanted, and that she should go
stick-it-to-da-man who brought her down. Sorry, I didn't think she'd go as far as
bringing up the Old Ones. Actually I did think it, but I didn't care, lol.�

I was furious with Ares then, because of his indifference my planet was
probably dust by now. Trying to calm myself I asked him one simple question:

�Can I kill that monster, Ares? Can I kill an Old One?�

�Not that I'm in any support of death, in fact the opposite, but yes, I think
you are above and beyond in enough power to take on an eldritch abomination like
them.�

�Send me back Ares, I have a bone to pick with whatever it is you made.�

�Yeah yeah, alright, when?�

�What do you mean 'when'? I'm feeling in a bit of a head-bashing mood NOW.�
 �No no no retard, I mean when in HISTORY, the temporal portals don't just
travel space but also time.�

�Any time huh? Send me back to the moment you took me away, I want at least a
little husk of the world leftover when I'm through.�

�Alright, but don't say I didn't warn you.�

Before I could object, or ask what he meant, a portal opened behind me and
with an almost cartoonish mallet he shot me through and back into my own world.
Right into the city sized jaws I escaped by leaving.
Chapter five(finale): Starchild.
(wanderer of time)
Ares's hit was too powerful and I could not stop, I flew right into the
beast's mouth. I was swallowed, engulfed by the chaotic nonsense build of the Old
One. I had destroyed stars, made cities, worked alongside gods and monsters, had I
come all this way to be some colossal squid's dinner? No! I concentrated my power,
ripping the space around me and filling it with diamond, and then let loose. And
let loose it was. I tore to my heart's content within the beast and erupted in an
unearthly explosion of diamond crystal, shattering the monster as I shot skyward,
the thrill of my first victory in it's cries.

The further I flew, the more I dreaded, as I could see the surrounding land
and it was saturated with them, like maggots on the worlds greatest and final
feast, disintegrating the ground beneath them and taking it into themselves. I
watched in horror as they glided across the world, absorbing entire chunks of land
in mere strides. I saw all around the black remains of where they had been, and I
saw that the land where I had lived, where my family and friends were, where my
former work and most of all where Darla was, was blackest of all.

I felt a crushing feeling in a place on me that had not existed for five
years now. I felt and extreme emptiness and chill although cold no longer existed
for me. I felt as though I had nothing. No home, no parents or siblings, no friends
or even future, I had nothing. I felt sorrow and the hole in my chest where the
lines met began to glow yellow, and my sorrow quickly turned to hate. I could not
let end as an empty shell on a buffet for giant monsters! This was MY world, not
theirs, if they wanted it they'd have to go through me first!

I began to build power, turning the limiters on my body down bit by bit, I
wanted to give these things the hell they were trying so hard to make. I felt my
power peak and all at once I clawed the air, ripping it apart, I filled it with my
love, my hatred, and all of my sorrow, and tore across the land. I sent them the
most destructive aspects of my self, and both glory and awe was had by even these
continents with faces, as I tore them asunder with my denial of fate.
(Burning star)
I drifted lightly now, falling to the calmed world I had restored. I blazed
across the sky now, falling down in a pyre of glory as the world beneath could now
rebuild, and as I came crashing to the ground, asleep but aware of the world around
me. I slept for what must have been weeks, not watching but feeling the rebuild of
humanity around me, huts and families being built as the shadow of the Old Ones was
lifted. After some time, enough to regain my energy, I arose from my crater to a
world different than I had left it. I trod upon the land, saw children playing and
people building. I then began to hear the hushed whispers as people started to
notice me. Of course I stood out a bit, a tall human shaped thing glowing orange
and spiral lines sprouting from a hole in my chest, but something stood out more
than I. A power. I felt it from here but knew it was far, far away, not even in the
solar system, but was approaching fast. I could feel it, no, SEE it, plain as day.
I watched it crash to earth with ground shaking velocity. I could see it, on the
other side of the world, something powerful, something strong. Then, through an
entire world, I locked eyes with it.

(The creation)
I once again felt the pangs of anger pull red curtains over my yellow eyes,
but this time it was different. This time there was no desire to protect, nor urge
to wreak vengeance. This was a competitive rage, an anger of two equal beings with
the desire to erase each others existence. I blasted forth, my mind wracked with a
desire for destruction I had no control over, no force could stop me from the
destruction I sought. The ground beneath me was but a quick blur as I readied my
fist for an opponent I could only see in my mind's eye, and in an instant there was
contact. I could not really see what my body was doing, but there was definite
conflict, a battle too fast for the eye and so powerful each blow shook the earth.

(The sea of stars)

The intense war of two halted for a moment I could see my assailant and prey.
It held a similar shape to me, only slightly more feminine, with a slick black
colour in place of my red and yellow, as well of a head of tentacle-like hair and
absolutely no face save for two bright green eyes. As I was examining it, it was
probably doing the same to me. Then, to my shock and disbelief, it spoke.

�Why hello lover, I was sad you missed dinner at 8:00, the show was oh, so
beautiful.�

Then in a motion of obvious dissatisfaction, what I now knew could only be

Darla grew exponentially in all dimensions. This was all a show to her, and though
the shock and confusion of what was revealed to me was devastating, the rage I felt
could not be sated. Motionlessly my body tore the space around it and filled it
with itself, growing to meet the goddess nemesis I once asked out, growing to rival
even those blasted old ones she called upon for destruction. The final battle had
begun, as two gods fought over earth while standing high above the heavens, hungry
for each others demolition.

(Finale)
Our blows rocked the very foundation of existence as the world watched in awe
of the two titans fighting for dominance. We toiled and crashed, tossed and clawed
at each other, devastating what little there was left of the surroundings, but we
didn't care. We were both indestructible by nature, but we also both knew that we
could erase each other with the opportunity and the power we had in store. Blow
after blow we fought, her powers which seemed to affect gravity as a concept, and
my power to separate the most complex of things clashed and the world was torn
about from beneath us. The opportunity finally presented itself, and I leaped on
the chance, striking a direct blow across her stomach. I manifested all the power,
creative and destructive, and tore not a hole in space, but rather the concept of
reality, and bent it to my will, turning her body from matter that constructed her
body into anti-matter, and watched as she slowly dissolved into the air when the
atmosphere fused and deleted itself with her. It was a twisted bit of irony I
experienced then and there, how glorious and powerful I felt at the destruction I
had originally wanted to save the most. But I had done it, I defeated the greatest
threat to what was left of earth, and in turn was nominated it's new god through
this victory. I understood what what Ares had made, I understood the code, and
Ares's role in this place, I understood that his code was the breaker of
boundaries, and that he was the conflict that pushes those conflicted to break
these boundaries. I was once normal, but thanks to that thing called Ares, I now
sit supreme on a throne over my world.

FIN.
Epilogue notes on the matter from Ares himself:
�Complete failure! I give him the power to evolve and what does he do? He
goes and kills his own kind and pretends to be omnipotent'n all on a planet he
helped pretty much back to the stone age, that's what! I really got to stop giving
humans the code, they never f***ing use it right, my Mayan gods this pisses me off!
Saved his world my ass! I miss the lizardmen, they knew how to have fun with power,
damn!�