| "We need to talk," a strange man in a odd leather coat says softly,
looking angrily over at Chaos.
(Author's Note: Before we go any further, that last song was....of course,
a tune from the group called Metallica. Just a needed thing to be
said here).
Slith knows somehow that these beings before are NOT speaking Common,
Draconian, English (or American if you come from Rifts Earth)...but something
else. Something that only a small trickle....the bare essence of what they
were saying....was trickling into the Sivak's mind.
"Not that words will do," the other strangely clad....person?......says,
"The Beast, one of your cronies, that guarded the Tower had been in on
the Plot.....and by Pancaking Krynn space with those of this Sector which
you call the Prime Material Planes....."
Somehow, Slith and those still conscious and watching know that "pancaking"
means that the walls of reality, if destroyed, would cause something akin
to the floor of a room in a tall building collapsing. The contents of the
affected room would crash down into the room below it, and in this case
would cause that floor to collapse into the room below it. And so on and
so on. But these "rooms" were actually realities....
It wasn't something that Slith wanted to experience at all!
"He expired before we could get to the bottom of things.....the best
lead to FINALLY explain just why things are happening with the Dark Tower,"
the pale man sighs, "But he did mention you. We came calling to see you,
'Chaos'."
The Turtle had been the thing that had done It in.....
Rule 179 sighs, wishing he could have taken back that mistake.....
Cowabunga, Agent 179 sent to him, also filled with a regret for
lost opportunites.
The last part is dripping with mockery....as if this Greater God of
Krynn Space is a joke. Slith hisses a small, frightened hiss as something
like a wave of.....power......rolls off of the strangers before him. Indeed,
somehow Slith knows that these strangers.....somehow.....are more worthy
to be called a deity than Chaos....or those others of the Krynn pantheon!
But..... they are not gods?
Slith blinks in confusion weakly, still crumpled where he lay.
"You're with Ao?" Chaos whispers weakly to the leather clad stranger,
confused, point at the other.....stranger.
Chaos then freezes in his tracks as the strangers step closer.....the
face (if that is what you could call it) frozen in a rictus of horror.....and
pain. It seems to last both a microsecond (Slith wonders where he learned
that term for such a small unit of time) and for a billion years. When
done, the being known as Chaos crumbles in on himself and vanishs without
even a trace. Slith knows that......the creature was dead. Dead? No. More
like "offline" for recycling?!
These strangers weren't anything he wanted to deal with but the Sivak
was too weak to move!
What was left in the "deity's" place was an odd pile of pages stapled
together. It appeared to be a manuscript of some type printed on green
paper. Slith read the title on it (it was printed in a language he could
somehow read). It was called The Gunslinger by somebody named Stephen
King.
"So it begins where it ends and ends where it begins," Slith hears one
of the strangers say behind him (the one with twin "revolvers" on his hips).
Roland knew that he was witnessing the very beginning of this fracas.
The point where those within the Dark Tower, the Rules and Agents, suddenly
found out why things there were going haywire. This was before the
time of their Champions.....
Boy did he have questions for them when he got to the Dark Tower, finally.....
Slith gets the feeling that the stranger knows more about this situation
than he does. That and that somehow these....beings are not aware of the
people behind him. How he knows this he doesn't know. He just knows that
he knows.
Roland could have sympathized.
With an odd look, the one known as Rule 179 looks over to his Chaos
counterpart and then picks up the odd manuscript....and reads it aloud.
"The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed."
he read simply aloud.
The long shot? Agent 179 sends to his order counterpart, blinking.
The stranger then seems to open up his senses to more quickly absorb
this....clue? Other books (odd books who's cover were made of a thick papery
substance it looked to Slith's eyes). The Rule reads then quickly as well
and then suddenly staggers....as it dawns upon him what was contained within.
"The answer was in front of our noses.....in the clients hands and we
never....." he gags, aghast.
Agent 179 looks a bit sick....and extremely embarrassed as well.
"Uh, sir? Sirs, what's going on?" Slith calls weakly over to the stranger
before good sense stops him.
The strangers turn and look at him, seeming to finally deign to not
his existence. Annoyed looks quickly are replaced with ashamed looks.
"Think we need to reexamine things," Rule 179 says to his counterpart,
knowing that this manuscript will shake things up back at the Home Office,
"And our order in things....."
"Simply put....we are trying to find out why things are going wrong....and
prevent the end of all things in all material realities," Agent 179 begins
simply, "Chaos was one of a small group bent on the destruction
of all....."
Slith's eyes bug at that.
The Celstrials might have said more, but then.....
"The Higher Up(s)......" Rule 179 whispers, a tone of reverence....and
fear in his voice.
Slith has a second to begin to wonder just what could scare these king
of beings when.....he gets his answer! Slith, when he looks back and tries
to remember it's not clear at all. All he does remember is great happiness....and
a sense of care for him and others. He can't remember how many beings....Gods
or Goddess?.....one?......Many?...... Whatever the case, he's not sure,
but he looks back on it fondly. Perhaps it's a conceit of his Draconian
nature, but the face he tries to put on the "Higher Up(s)" (can't remember
if it was singular or plural) is......a perfect version of a Draconian.
Later, he finds out that others saw and put a face that was of their race.
Odd, but then that's a characteristic of many intelligent races to see
themselves in other.....larger things than themselves.....like their deities.
But what he does remember with perfect clarity is awakening with an
seductive, wonderful, and powerful feeling of the wind beneath his mighty
wings as he and the others find themselves circling their convoy. He shouts
in surprise as he sees himself and the others of his regiment in the form
of various metallic dragons! Dragons that their eggs had been produced
from, really.
Their equipment and weaponry had melded withing their new bodies, Slith
sensed.
Out of sorts, they all land, and find themselves shifting back into
their old Draconian forms (albeit with scales that now shine like they'd
been polished within an inch of their lives). They turn to find the strangers
looking back at them.
Kang and Slith look at each other, and somehow they and the other
Draconians knew that answers perhaps lay with these others.
And boy do the Draconians want answers!
-
 "What the
Hell was that?" Kang asks in a wavering voice.
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