"Come on, come on we have to help them. You big LUMP!"
Lord Celex tugged at the chains pulling the reluctant Kelly after him. Two years in complete sensory deprivation and isolation from revelation had done a number on her, and despite his vow to bring her back, Lord Celex was having trouble. Even so he was grateful for her presence.

It would have been inaccurate to say that his own isolation hadn't had negative affects on him. Without her there, and without something to actively do, he was worried that he might slip away from sheer boredom and hopelessness. He actively tried not to think about that, instead turning all of his energy and attention towards Kelly, now one of the only things holding him in place.

He wasn't sure he was making progress with her at all, she didn't speak, barely moved, and only followed Kazna's orders when given, but with a little work, lord Celex could lead her around, and she seemed to relax when offered comforting gestures, like a touch on the arm or hand.

It wasn't much, and he wasn't really the man for comfort, but he was working on it.

But now Kelly was only secondary in his concern.

First of all was Sunny, Adam, and their little son Kay.

Lord Celex didn't know much about what had gone on back in the world after he had died other than the few tidbits that Kazna gave him. He knew his son had ascended to the throne like they had always planned, and hadn't lost it as of yet. He knew that Kelly had been murdered, of course, and he knew that Adam and Sunny had a biological son somehow. He wasn't entirely sure how that worked, but it did, and now he knew that Kazna was after her daughter and the baby.

Lord Celez was vaguely aware of the passage of time. From what Kazna had said it had been a few years since Kelly had died, and a little over a year since the child was born, and in that time Kazna had been regaining her strength. He knew for a fact Kazna liked others to think she was more powerful than she was, but the truth remained that the void didn't give her much of its power to work with, and her little habit of portaling around used up energy like stupid people used up his patience: i.e there was a very shallow reserve of it, and it went unbelievably fast.

Killing Kelly had taken an immense amount of energy, and keeping both of their souls imprisoned like she was locked up even more of her energy on a permanent basis. By killing Kelly and locking her away in the void, Kazna had almost completely destroyed herself consuming all the energy that she was allotted. It had taken almost two years for her to regain a fraction of her power, and even after that her attempt to send Kelly to assassinate the GA president had been unsuccessful.

If she just waited a little longer, gained more power she might have been able to do what she did with Kelly, but lord Celez was relieved she didn't have the kind of patience. Now, portaling was no longer an option , and she was simply stuck with summoning the void as one of her baseline abilities.

Despite all this he knew that he had to do something.

Sunny was strong, but there was no telling what Kazna was willing to do to get Kay.

Lord Celex didn't understand the situation all that well, but he knew for certain that even if Sunny WAS capable of holding her own, it was better safe than sorry.

He pulled Kelly forward their two hands chained together, collars tight around both of their necks. Kelly still kept the form of a humanoid galaxy pulsing with inner orange light while little stars and galaxies spun inside her.

The little galaxies and patterns had grown more and more prominent during her captivity, and he was almost certain that remembering the universe was comforting to her somehow. He sat her down and knelt next to her. He wasn't sure what he was doing, but he knew a couple of things.

He needed energy.

He didn't know how much he needed or even how to use it, but if he was going anywhere he was going to need a surge of power. From the Polaris revelation he knew that the anima was a powerful source of energy, and well, he had two anima sitting unused right here. His only issue was that he didn't know HOW much energy they contained. It was possible that what he was about to attempt was going to burn one or both of them out permanently, but he just had to hope that was not the case.

From what he saw of Kazna, he had a hunch that void energy was far less effective in power output than regular anima energy, and by making a deal with the void she actually made herself incapable of harnessing anima energy. This was all conjecture of course, but he didn't have the luxury of simply pretending anymore.

Lord Celex leaned forward putting his hands on either side of Kelly's face, stars swirling under his hands.

She was cold.

Even without eyes, he got the sense that she wasn't looking at him.

He spoke low and soft infusing his words with a kindness he had rarely used when he was alive, "I need you to help me help our friends." She didn't answer, "You remember Sunny and Adam don't you?" Still no response, "Adam, he was like a son to you, don't you remember. You helped him get a ship, he was on your crew for a while. You two were very close." Still she said nothing, but he plowed on hoping he could do this without her but also hoping that his words might strike a cord somewhere inside her, "Sunny is his wife, and they have a little boy, and now their baby is in danger. Kazna wants him for soemthing and we cannot let that happen, you hear me."

She leaned into one of his hands reaching up to cup his palm to the side of her face.

He sighed, "You don't understand a word I'm saying do you."

She didn't respond but held his hand to her face quietly. She just seemed to enjoy his touch.

He looked up, finding only darkness for his inspiration and sighed. Not like anyone was going to see what he did here anyway, so he leaned forward wrapping his arms around the void shadow, pulling her close. She felt so small in his arms, so cold. It was a sensation he had never experienced as the gesture was almost entirely human in nature. Now that he thought about it, he had experienced the gesture once, as a recipient rather than the source held I the arms of a human as cold threatened to steal his life force away.

She rested her head on his shoulder and he hugged her tighter closing his eyes, "We're going to save them ." He said softly, and then began the first stages of his plan. He had dared not practice when he knew Kazna was anywhere near, so he wasn't sure if this would work at all, but he had to try.

Ribbons slowly began to detach themselves from his back, floating upward and billowing around him in a great cloud. He felt his limbs elongate slightly, felt his fingers extend. Meat and muscle melted away from his bones as skin drew right to a starborn skull. He didn't have to do it this way, but he found it was certainly easier.

As soon as the transformation was halfway over, he could feel it.

Another mind butting up against his like the hull of two ships knocking together on a rolling sea. He closed his eyes even tighter, held his breath and dove in.

What he felt was likely immersing himself in a freezing lake of ice water, black as marble and so cold it was agony. He screamed through still human teeth as kelly's mind engulfed him, a vast well of pain and cold and darkness which battered against his head. Spikes of her burning cold consciousness drove themselves deep into his head as he dove deeper, impaling himself as if he had sprung headfirst into a rose bush but continued to claw his way forward.

Even as her pain engulfed him, he sensed her body slacken against his, muscles relaxing .

He couldn't stop to think about what that meant but dove deeper, struggling with the new sensation of being inside someone else's head, invading someone else's mind. He swam in darkness and cold for what seemed like forever feeling for the very center, for the core. He was so deep now that he worried he might not be able to surface, and he floundered for a long moment gasping and in panic, but then he felt soemthing.

It brushed past him in the dark, and he stopped tugging gently at the thread with his mind until it pulled taught leading him deeper into the depths.

He gripped it tight and followed downward, deeper, and deeper, until he came upon soemthing he could not explain.

It was like an infant star hidden away, relegated to darkness and pulsing weakly in the night, but still it burned heating the darkness around him with its meager light.

Notably it did not burn orange.

Lord Celex took a deep breath, reached forward, and grabbed it.

***

"hand the boy to me."

The hands that reached out for her were large and dark, with long black fingers that just seemed so, wrong she couldn't explain it. Kay began to cry just then, and in that moment, Sunny knew that giving up her baby was the last thing she was going to do.

The flood of clarity that came to her was so powerful it felt like being hit by a car, but still she embraced it using that to anchor herself to a body that did not feel like hers, but she knew belonged to her. Sunny gripped the shaft of her spear with one of her upper hands gently shifting Kay to one of her lower arms.

He continued to cry and whimper his face spattered with dust and ask. She hoped that not to much of it would get into his mouth or lugs, but she had to risk it if she was going to save his life. She thought momentarily about setting him down in the moss, but feared what might happen if he was out of her site for a single moment.

What if the entity was not alone.

"hand the boy to me." The voice came again, and with her mind moving slowly Sunny finally understood who the voice belonged to.

A fire flared up inside her, and she turned on the spot in rage.

With one sharp moment Sunny turned spear held in one hand driving forward through her back legs and up through her shoulder right towards the creature's throat.

It was a perfect shot, aimed perfectly.

Kazna caught the spear with impunity, her glowing yellow eyes manifesting in the dark.

"You!" Sunny hissed.

Kazna roared and lunged forward arms reaching for Sunny, and for baby Kay who screamed madly with fear at his mother's back. Kazna's fingers brushed Sunny's throat, but two things happened simultaneously, so fast Sunny could barely comprehend what she was seeing.

A blinding light erupted into being over her head, searing her eyes and though her body still blocked kay from the worst of it.

Her ears rang.

At the same time something slammed into Kazna from the side.

Sunny didn't see what it was at first, caught only glimpses, but she was left with only confusion. What she had seen were the antlers and billowing folds of a cynderstrider, an anin creature that exclusively hibernated until the dark season, where it feasted on the particles taken up by the ash, using their billows to sale through gale force winds, and now this creature had slammed into Kazna at cinderwind speed knocking both of them to the ground.

The light overhead continued to burn.

She heard Kazna scream.

The body of the cynderstrider rolled across the ground and vanished into the whirling ash.

Sunny looked up hand held over her face and found the light emanated from soemthing shaped like a body.

Kazna screamed, and then the whole world imploded.

Sunny had just enough time to cover Kay with her body as the light erupted outward and the greater part of the darkness imploded in toward on itself, folding into a single point and taking Kazna with it.

Sunny lay in the dust for a moment, the world around her gone unusually quiet. She could still feel ash falling against her skin, but eh wind was gone.

Slowly she unfolded herself from her kneeling position Kay still howling, clinging to her with all four of his tiny hands. His screams echoed eerily in the silence, and she tilted her head back, watch as the remaining ash descended from the sky in gentle flurries like fallen snow. The sky began to clear remarkably quick, and she could already see the blue peaking through.

When she looked down at her hands, her body felt like her body. Kay was real in her arms, his tiny hands cold against her skin.

She held him closer, soothed him softly until his screams turned to soft whimpering, and distressed chirping.

She held him close, wiped the ash from his face and ventured out into the fallen cynders, and saw something lying not to distant. At first it was merely a silhouette on the ground, but as she drew closer, she found a body lying in the ash.

"Adam!" she gasped. Using her upper arms to roll him over onto his back.

He was painted almost completely grey with ash. His white hair fully saturated, his face gone grey like a statue. His clothing was almost completely shredded, and his mechanical leg was missing all together. She looked around in confusion, trying to find it but saw nothing.

How did he get here.

What had happened?

When his eyes fluttered she was shocked to find that his mechanical eye was missing as well. He looked up at her with an expression of distant concern, one hand reaching up to grip her arm hard, pulling her in with a surprising strength, "Kay, is he ok."

"yes, yes he's ok." She whispered, her voice choking hard in her throat.

With a sigh he let his arm fall back to the ash and closed his eyes, "Ok, I.... sleep now."

And he did.

She was left sitting in the ash holding one member of her family in one hand and resting a hand on the other as ash coated his body.

What the hell had just happened