PRL Serials

The Y.G.

Amidst gray debris, Alia’s hair is now orange and it matches her shiny armor as she drifts and reorients herself. The sword is long in her hand and she searches the distance around her for the yellow rock that should be apparent. Before she looks completely around herself, she sees Nebuchad, floating unconscious, in the same spiffy suit in which she had found him, only it is gray like the debris around them. Alia grabs him, hoping to shake him awake, but he is immovable, like he weighs more than she can overcome, even in this Dreamscape that allows for wondrous feats of strength 

“Nebuchad?” she calls to him, but his eyes are closed and he is unresponsive. 

Then, in the distance behind him, Alia sees the yellow rock. She doesn’t want to leave him, but she yearns to continue on her quest. She decides that she can generate an explosion in Nebuchad’s vicinity, big enough to propel him in the direction of the yellow rock without harming him, and allowing her the chance to absorb the yellow and then retrieve him close by. 

Alia focuses, recessing through the colors she has collected, her hair and armor changing from orange, to red, and finally to white. Her eyes glow and she focuses two lasers at a point in space where the light collects and begins to swell into a star. When it is as large as Sun of Earth, it pulsates with energy and Alia approaches it at the opposite side where Nebuchad is still unresponsive. She pokes at the large light construct and its outside fixes in place while the luminescent inside rages and expands against the confines that eventually explode, sending out tremendous force that sends Nebuchad and his density flying like a bullet toward the yellow rock. 

Alia made herself intangible, filling her mind with thoughts of smoke, and then elements that permeate, and the force wave did not propel her in the opposite direction that Nebuchad had traveled. She restores her construct and then the sword takes her at a high speed after Nebuchad who rides the force wave that Alia catches up to and uses as a slingshot to get her to the yellow rock even faster than the sword can normally go. As she is propelled toward the yellow, the color of her hair and armor revert through the collected, back to orange as she stops a ways from the yellow rock that is twice the size that the orange planet had been.

She decides to land on its surface as she flies, and after a while she is perplexed that she has been moving for some time, but she is no closer to the planet. When she flies away from it, she is able to make distance between herself and the planet, but she is only able to approach it at a specific distance before it seems that the planet retreats at the same rate that she approaches it. She finally stops and stares at the rocky surface, contemplating the problem.

How could she drain it if the planet retreated in fear? She blasts orange energy at it, but at the distance, she can’t sustain a steady force beam capable of truly impacting the surface; the orange energy dissipates over vast space. 

Of course it is some sort of metaphor, she thinks to herself. How do you beat a scared rock? Or how do you beat fear itself?

You surround it with power, Alia realizes and she has an idea that she is not sure she is capable of completing. She floats as close to the planet as she can before it retreats and she imagines the area all around it. She draws a line of orange light around its equator and then she focuses for enough time, exactly how long is hard to determine, that the thin line of orange light swells into a glowing orange band around the solid yellow, rocky surface of the planet. When the band is as large as the planet, Alia detonates it, and the yellow rock cracks all around the surface, like a black bolt of lightning running the bright yellow surface. Alia flies at it and even though she can sense it retreating, it is much slower and she eventually catches up to it and punches into the black crevice. The planet explodes and she draws the yellow energy to her with a hand in the air and her hair flailing amidst the chaos. When she is done, she senses Nebuchad approaching her. She is surprised that he is alert. Even more surprised to see him being held with a sword to his throat. 

Clay is behind Nebuchad as they float and approach with a hand over his mouth, and Alia has never seen Clay so scary. She is yellow and she is extremely bright, but Clay is green and very dark, in an armor to match hers.

“Come with me, or I will consume your friend!” Clay yells. His voice sounds familiar but harsh, very mean. 

“Do you know me Clay?”

Clay spits and Alia is surprised that she can see it leave his mouth and travel through the space between them, but as it approaches, Alia can see it as a ball of green fire that she knocks away.

“Come with me filth!” Clay screams and he moves the sword from Nebuchad’s neck. It is engulfed in green flames as he plunges it through the back of Nebuchad’s calf. Clay smiles as Nebuchad screams in pain.

“Ok!” Alia screams. “Leave him alone! Let’s go.”

Clay ties Nebuchad in dark green ropes and flies into the darkness, Nebuchad dangling behind him, and Alia follows. It isn’t long before she sees the large and impressive planet made of green emerald that shines like a precious gem, even in the vast darkness.

They land at the North Pole of the emerald planet and Clay handles Nebuchad like he isn’t a person.

“Calm down with that!” Nebuchad screams. He isn’t hurt as Clay drags him along behind him and tosses him around the dusty terrain, he is just uncomfortable.

“The King is this way. He is lucky. I would give anything to be the one to kill you.”

Alia doesn’t recognize the man snarling and spitting fireballs at her. He looks like Clay, she even recognizes his energies as Clay, but he is so vicious and mean, nothing like the man she had lived with. He is impressive in his dark green armor, and his hair and the entirety of his eyes are green as well. Alia stands out in her shiny yellow.

There is a gigantic palace that is sculpted into jagged rocks, like tall mountains with sharp tips. When they enter, Clay ties Nebuchad to a rock formation. Inside, everything is polished emerald and they walk a long and lush green carpet that is lined on either side with jagged rock formations. At the end of the carpeted walkway, Alia recognizes Ivan on the large throne that is up on a pedestal before a long staircase. He wears thick, flowing robes, all dark green. He stands and descends the stairs and when he is standing before them, he bows to Alia and presents his sword.

“I am yours,” he says in his bow, before Clay kicks him and he tumbles against the stone staircase.

“You don’t deserve your crown! Kill her and free us!” Clay stands over Ivan yelling down at him.

“What is happening?” Alia yells. “Why are you here?”

“To kill you and then the rock will use its magic to make a world for us, just me and Ivan. But only Ivan is strong enough. And he won’t do it because he doesn’t love me!”

As Clay yells, green energy radiates from him and he grows in size. As he grows, Ivan shrinks. Alia hits Clay with her yellow light and it sends him flying, before he crashes into a rock formation and then hits the ground. She rushes to Ivan who is small enough for her to pick up with both her hands.

“I do want to make a world for us here,” Ivan says in a small voice, “but it’s not right, is it? It’s too good to be true?”

“It is, Ivan. Nothing here is real. Why are you here?”

“Because we’re not in control. We need help Alia. Can you help us?” 

Alia cries. “I wish, but I have something really big to do. It’s not coincidence that I found you here. I will send a message for you before I get rid of this place and you never have to see Clay like that again. Who would you like to speak to and what is the message?”

“Tell Detective Young that we’re at the CZS. Tell him that the CZS made the zombies and they’re trying to do the same to us. Tell him how to find us.”

“I can manage that.”

Alia concentrates and focuses her attention on the man, Detective Paul Young, who had helped her and Kevin and others stop monsters that overran a neighborhood. It takes time, it is a real distraction from her current mission and threatens to derail the progress that she has made, but she finds the psyche of Paul Young and she passes along Ivan’s message. In order to complete the task of contacting Paul, Alia had to retrieve her spirit from her physical body, and then split her spirit energies into two entities, the one that held her place on the quest for the Rainbow Road and the other that sought out Paul. When it is done, she marvels at the feat that she didn’t know was possible, but was necessary for her to help a very dear friend who is in need.

When she is her whole self again, she sends her spirit back to her body and resumes her quest inside the emerald castle with the unconscious Clay, and the tiny Ivan in her hand.

Alia cries and she apologizes to Ivan, even though she knows he will survive what comes next.

Alia stands and yells so loudly that the castle around her begins to crumble. And as she yells, her yellow energy gathers and creates a bright light that eventually explodes and causes the green energy at the core of the emerald planet to explode, smashing the rocky crust that covered it. Alia gathers and collects the green energy.