PRL Serials

I don’t think that we need to be running, the Needy says inside of Zacchaeus’s mind. 

“What should we be doing?” Zacchaeus asks out loud. 

I can stop it. I can eliminate this young Omega. You know that we are so much more than what we were on our Earth now that I am in the Fonlands.

“But that’s Omega,” Zacchaeus says with real alarm. He can feel the Needy’s confidence, but Zacchaeus feels like they are being pursued by something terrifying and unfathomably large. The last thing he wants to do is stop running to face it.  

Not the same Omega that I knew and served. That Omega was on the same level as Master Issac…

“Don’t call him that seriously,” Zacchaeus interjects and he hears the Queen Rowen laughing despite the danger they are in. She doesn’t let up on her jetcycle, but she is amused by the exchange that she can follow telepathically. 

He’s not nearly as powerful as Issac. What is Issac’s plan, he needs a quintet to make a door to the veil to seal it away? Then let the Queen join him, the Superguardian, and the Wazads, while we face the Omega and then guide it into the veil. 

“You don’t have to face it head on,” the Queen Rowen offers. “They are testing guardians for a fifth as we speak. The two of us, the three of us, can work together to confuse it and steer it through the portal.”

That is an unnecessary risk, Queen. I know this Omega better than it knows itself. I know its potential. In my universe, the Omega spoke to me from across the heavens and convinced me of the glory of its vision of existence. I see the folly in that now, but I was its trusted follower and it showed me its darkness, and this one isn’t quite so dark yet. Believe me Zacchaeus, we can do this.

Zacchaeus is quiet and his companions are as well as they careen through the cosmos, careful to avoid inhabited planets that the Queen is able to sense from a way off as they move.

“What are you thinking, Zacchaeus?” the Queen Rowen asks after a while. 

“I think we should trust the Needy. You should contact Issac and meet him as fast as you can to start the spell he wants to do. Just reach out when we should bring Omega your way.”

The Queen Rowen wants to protest, but she knows that every second counts. She nods at Zacchaeus and then begins to head toward Bludon. Zacchaeus stops fast and when he is still, he has turned to face the oncoming darkness.

“Do your thing,” Zacchaeus says to the Needy and he splays out, his limbs spread space and then the oily, black being of the Needy explodes from his body, rushing through his every pore, so much more of the Needy than he realized he actually contained, though in reality the Needy is using Divine Essence to bring itself from the Fonlands and through Zacchaeus into a gigantic mass that stops the oncoming Omega in its tracks. 

Zacchaeus is all of the Needy, he can feel the expanse of it, and in this form, he can see Omega for what it is. It is a bipedal being of immense size, in a form that Zaccaheus recognizes as human-like. Omega’s skin is as black as empty space and the features of its face are indentations that convey rage.It seems to stand in space and it roars at the Needy, which doesn’t produce sound, but alters spacetime itself, creating a wave of force that flies fast at the Needy. The Needy allows the wave to impact it, and it expands to accommodate the awesome force that Zacchaeus couldn’t drive in human words. The Needy collects it and then contracts in the direction of Omega, sending esoteric energy back to its source, catching Omega off guard and smashing it back, sending it tumbling into open space. 

The Needy pursue Omega, hoping to keep it off guard, maybe even to frighten it, and as they move, Zacchaus is contacted by the Queen Rowen.

“Please respond if you can hear me,” Zaccaheus hears in his mind as the Needy plays with the Omega like a cat with a mouse. 

“I can hear you, Rowen,” Zaccaheus says aloud but he is not really aware of his mouth in his current state. He thinks he says it aloud. 

“Thank goodness, we’ve been trying to reach you for days,” the Queen Rowen says with relief in her voice. “Are you ok?”

“The Needy got carried away. He still knocking Omega around space. How long has it been? I lost track of time.”

“I left you five days ago. I reached Bludon after a day and we’ve been trying to tell you that we’re ready to do the spell. Can you bring Omega to the coordinates I will send you?”

Zacchaues confirms with the Needy, tapping into his mind the way he had Zacchaeus’s when their positions were reversed and the Needy was inside him.

“Good. Bring him as fast as you can. We will be waiting there for you.”

The Needy manages to push Omega to the location that the Queen Rowen sends, and as they arrive there, they see a large pentagram in space that is drawn by thick lightning bolts.

“This way, Zacchaeus,” Issac says to him when he is close. 

“You should be talking to the Needy,” Zacchaeus says. “He the one in control now.”

The Needy has wrapped Omega in a sheet of it large oily being and the darkness of its form seems to issue from a column of blackness. 

“Just get him through the center!” Zacchaeus hear Issac yell to the Needy. Then he feels the Needy launch Omega toward the pentagram. He doesn’t see what happens next, but he feels chaos, feels thick lightning bolts striking the form of the Needy, and then Zacchaeus is unconscious. 

Zacchaeus wakes in darkness.

You had everyone worried when I returned to Bludon. They thought that I had used the cataclysm as an excuse to consume you, but I realized that you would not be able to pilot us, so I have surrounded your physical body in my form. Just listen for now, I made a grievous mistake in my fight with the Omega.

“Did you dunk it in the veil?” Zacchaeus asks aloud, but his voice sounds wet.  

I tried, and it’s in there now, but somehow, Maria was pulled in after it. Issac says it wasn’t our fault, but Maria is lost in the veil with the Omega.

“Can’t Issac just pull her out?”

He tried and failed, and then the Omega tried to reemerge, so he is trying to figure something else out. 

“Where are we?” Zacchaeus asks and he feels the oily form of the Needy receding into him. Soon he sees Issac floating space with Sao-Reyne, the Queen Rowen, and Maxx the Superguardian. 

“You ok, Z?” Issac asks. “You been oily for a while, Maxx was getting triggered.”

“If I didn’t know who you are, I would swear that you were Minyak,” Maxx says. They all have communicators to speak freely. 

“You gone stop calling me Minyak,” Zacchaeus says. “I’ma have to meet this thing soon if you keep talking about it. But what’s going on? What happened to Maria?”

“She slipped into the veil…” Issac starts.

“She was called to Outer Spacetime,” Sao-Reyne interrupts. “I didn’t realize that this veil you were speaking of was the same as Outer Spacetime. The Omega will be a harmless nuisance there, and Maria will find a new destiny.”

“What is he talking about?” Zacchaeus looks to Issac.

“Maxx,” the Queen Rowen interrupts. “We have to get back down to the surface. My security is deteticing Daemon.”

“I thought I felt that familiar dread,” Maxx says. He looks to Zacchaeus. “Will you join me, Zacchaeus? It is probably Minyak, I wonder what your meeting will be like.”

Zacchaeus looks to Issac. “Can we go after Maria? We can’t leave her in Outer Spacetime, whatever the fuck that is.”

“You cannot pursue her,” Sao-Reyne says, shaking his head. “She is where she is supposed to be. She is Wazad, she has a purpose that is hard for others to understand.”

“You go with Maxx,” Issac says. “I’ll stay with Wazad here and figure out as much as I can. We will be on Fumarole.”

Zacchaeus worries about Maria, but he is happy to follow the Superguardian and the Queen Rowen back to the surface of Bludon. 

“Do you think I can get a quick nap or something?” Zacchaeus asks as they fly.