Celestial Fragments

The purple eyed stranger

Come my queen, my Goddess. I've been waiting for eons of time to lay my hands on you. I'll make you remember my name, crave my touch and seek for my embrace with every breath you take.

After the first instinct to answer the alarm, Angelique snapped to reality. The alarm was deafening, numbing any stray thought she could have had at this moment. Everyone seemed to react the same way. At first everyone froze in their place, with their words paused in their throats, as if they expected this to be some sort of error or at best an emergency drill.

Grimes was the first one to move from his spot, as he hurried to check the security screen.

"He has escaped again!" his voice roared over the sound of the alarm.

Everyone jumped from their seats and hurried out of the room, down the hallways at top speed, followed soon by guards. Grimes grabbed his seat at the security panel and started searching for their inmate, using the security cameras, locking doors, and updating his team mates at every move he was doing.

Aren't I just lucky? It's not even my first hour and I am already useless!

Angelique snapped from her daze, after the sound of the alarm was already numb for her senses. With wide eyes and confusion written all over her face, the woman approached Grimes, trying to ask for any sort of advice, order, command, anything that could help her understand what was happening.

"Stay put. For now." the command came, stopping her on her track towards his spot.

As if she were a simple voice commanded robot, Angelique stopped. Her gaze shifted to the security screen, where the cameras were dying one by one. Frustration, anger and maybe a little panic could be sensed from the boulder of a man sitting in front of her and she was slowly growing uneasy as well. Her eyes were set focused on Grimes, who suddenly rose from his seat. With calmness, the man opened one of the drawers and pulled out a small smoky colored box. The small box came flying in her direction. With not too much effort, Angelique snatched the box midair and opened it.

"Earphones?"

"Put them in. I'll guide you around." Grimes retook his seat at the security screens.

"How can you guide me when the cameras are dead?"

It was clear she was skeptical of all this. She slowly started to believe this was some sort of act, set up only to test her. With a slightly disgusted smirk, the woman shifted her weight on one of her legs, looking down at the earphones.

"Tracking devices and system. It's a waste of time to explain it now. Put them on and go."Grimes ordered, his voice stern.

"Right."

Her reply was only a muffled word, as she took the earphones out and set them in her ear, making sure they were steady.

"You'll find most of the guards going to the right, as soon as you exit the room, You take a left, and continue straight. By the time you need to turn, the earphones will be active and I'll make sure to get you there faster than everyone."

"You're going to send me there first?! What makes you think I'm the best person to be sent there? MAN I don't even know to walk around this place without getting lost!" Angelique tossed her arms in the air, but Grimes only gestured for her to hurry.

She knew very well she should bite her tongue and keep these for herself, but she could not help it. She felt unsafe and uneasy and she knew very well she was not fit to fight like this. Did these people know her? Did they ever read her file? She was a walking chaos bubble, ready to burst at the slightest touch. Yet, she did as she was told. She turned on her heels and hurried out of the room. Grimes seemed to be serious about all this, and if he trusted her with this, she should trust herself as well, right? When she was out of the room, she turned left, and checked if the earphones were working by tapping one.

"Great. I see you. As I said, straight ahead, and hurry."

"Understood." Angelique nodded her head slightly for herself, before she started running. "What are we dealing with?" In her tone there was a noticeable switch. It was clear she had finally understood it was a real emergency and she was needed sane and sharp, as Blanche told her.

"A Demi-God." came the answer. "Turn right."

After she heard the command, she noticed the hallway opening in three directions. She did not hesitate to do as she was told, running into descending stairs. Without hesitation, she started to leap four or five steps at once.

"A Demi-god?"

"Exactly. To be more precise. An An'ekd. When you reach the end of the stairs, left."

"A what?"

During all this time in the facility, she had only once encountered this name and it was fuzzy and hazy in her memory.

"An old-" a pause came "-a race that fell eons of time ago. The legend of their kind says they went against their own Gods, the creators of the Universe- Angelique pause!" Grimes ordered.

Angelique stopped immediately, her pose a defensive stance similar to a cat, almost on her fours, her upper body lowered close to the ground, a stray hair falling on her forehead. Her chest was rising and falling rapidly as she looked around, her pupils dilated, searching for danger.

"There's someone there." Grimes spoke.

"I can sense it." Angelique replied, as she slowly straightened, flexing her fingers slowly and taking a few more steps forward.

"Careful Angelique... I'll tell Kai to turn around and come help you. He's the only one nearby."

"Rogered." she replied to the man at the other end of the earphones as she continued her way forward slowly, her heels clicking against the floors, the sound echoing in the hallways.

She could sense danger all around her. The hair on the back of her head was standing up, as she could feel herself come closer and closer to the source of the danger. Was this really an An'ekd? How? An'ekds were known to be a myth, nothing more but legends and fables to tell children at night. There were so little know and documented information about this race, that they had to be made up for those who liked to dream of luxury and power.

"And yet, you have the occasion to meet one in this life." a voice came from behind her, making her freeze in her spot. Footsteps could be heard coming from the same direction, slow, taunting, getting closer to her.

Angelique turned her head to the side, trying to catch a glimpse of the one behind her. She could tell from the sound of their voice, the arrogance was something she could not describe in words.

"Such a shame you might as well not live to tell the story of how you met the last An'ekd."

"Angelique... hang in there. Don't engage in combat. Make him talk..." Grimes spoke in her ear, making her twitch her head lightly as if she wanted to buzz away a fly.

TALK ABOUT WHAT? THE WEATHER?!

A soft amused huff could be heard from the one behind her, making her a little more confident to turn around and face the one making threats. When she did so, her eyes laid on a very unexpected sight.

A very human figure was standing only a few feet away from her, blocking the way back on the stairs. It appeared to be a man, standing at around 6'2 from what she could figure, dressed a little unusual. He wore a peculiar uniform, nothing she had seen around the facility at all, with gold accents on white carefully crafted fabric. It looked like it was taken out of elvish tales, with long tight sleeves, a stiff collar going up on his neck and stopping at its middle, open in the front to offer him mobility, with hardened protective armour on soft spot and shoulders from where a purple night sky cape started, draped behind him, reaching the floor, in shades that started from deep orchid switched to true purple, plum and indigo, a cape that seemed to dance like a flame with every of his moves. He wore boots, his trousers had leather straps on each side of his legs, with small golden accents here and there that made him look even taller than he already was. His arms were protected with gauntlets of an unknown material, in colors and shades that seemed to be drawn from a galaxy far away, matching with his mystic cape and boots.

When her eyes dared to pull away from his clothes, they landed on an inhumanly handsome face. It was clean without a stubble, pale skin with hints of pink undertones, sharp angled chin, jaw and cheek bones. His cheeks were ever so slightly sunken in, drawing attention to his elongated and pointy ears. His eyes were almond shaped, elongated just a little, a hunter spark behind shimmering wisteria, lilac and ripe plum colors, making one think there were entire galaxies trapped in his eyes. The more she gazed into his eyes, the more she felt like helpless prey. His face was framed by platinum white hair, long and straight, falling down a little over his chest level.

"Are you done staring?" the man spoke, amused, as he posed with his arms opened towards her, pulling her out of her mind, from her small and safe closet.

"Who do I have the honour?" Angelique spoke, her anxiety masked almost perfectly with a thick layer of arrogance.

"Oh, pardon me. Aellioah Lorakian. And you are?"

" Angelique."

"Just Angelique?" a brow rose with curiosity and maybe a little irritation.

With a side smirk, Angelique nodded her head slowly. Grimes had gone completely silent. She did not know if any help was on its way or not, she did not know what happened and if everyone else was alright, so she was ready to fight, despite the order she was given. One of her hand rose up without hesitation, and out of thin air, she pulled out a black scepter, fingers curling around it tightly, bringing it between them. The scepter was long, made out of something that seemed to be metal, with a milky white sphere trapped at its end, sphere that shimmered and radiated light.

A smirk crossed the An'ekd's face as he watched her adopt an attack stance, his head leaning to the side slowly, his eyes taking her figure in, as he remained silent. Who was this woman? On her hand, he could notice scale patterns, flat on her skin. Was it a tattoo or was it scars? She appeared to be nothing but a punny human at first. There was nothing special about her at the first glance, and yet this punny human managed to conjure such a weapon our of thin air. And not just a simple weapon. It was clear this was alien craftsmanship.

"Who are you, Angelique?"

As Aellioah spoke, he stepped closer to the female, with small steps, one leg after the other, his eyes fixed on hers. Drawn completely towards her, the man allowed his guard to fall, without considering what was about to happen.

From the stairs, a dark figure appeared. It jumped all the way down with grace, a steady step, rose his weapon and smith the An'ekd at the nape of his neck with force, enough to knock him out. With lips parted, eyes still fixed on Angelique, Aellioah fell like a log, face first, on top of the new recruit. A little taken aback by the situation, Angelique stumbled backwards a few steps, under the weight of the platinum white haired man, her weapon vanishing as easy as it appeared before, her arms going up to catch and support the strange man. Her arms hooked under his armpits, her hands resting on his back as she stopped him from falling face first on the floor, her eyes fixed on his head.

"Great job, Angel." Kai muttered in a low voice, as he tossed the wooden bat away and approached to help her while asking Grimes for backup and help to get the An'ekd back into his cell.

As Kai took over, Angelique paused in her spot watching the team immobilize and take Aellioah away. This encounter made her uneasy in a very different way. A way she could not really understand. Something she had never in her life encountered.

"You can come back upstairs, Angelique. I'll show you how to file a report, so you can make your own every time something happens and keep track of everything." Grimes's voice echoed in her ear, making her jump and pull the earphones out of her ears, before starting to make her way back.