The Tale of a Trinacornagon

"...at this early stage, the scatter appears random, but the seeds of pattern have already been sown..."

***

[Unitopia, Eastern Continent]

Desolation. It is a word that fell woefully short of the new sight that graced their eyes. And yet, it was all that they could think of. Ziriothrax had seen wars that ravaged and tore across worlds, across suns, across galaxies and more. He had seen so-called desolation a billion-billion times over, and yet each time that fickle mistress would find him just the same. Only a single thought across all his minds, united in purpose.

Hate.

It was an inexhaustible hate, fueled by the only eternity which Ziriothrax had vowed to tear down in the moment he was granted that name. Granted that purpose. His eyes had seen the truth of the world, and where others had cracked and broke, his will was reforged into something far more dense. Into the stuff of myth and legend.

He would not yield, not before any god or man or mythical being. Plenty had tried, and he had razed their galaxies to the ground like the chaff they were. Naught to remain of them but fertiliser for new growth.

And so it was that two beings, large and small, appeared in the midst of desolation. The blue sun here was dimming, approaching the horizon despite the town they had left being in the throes of morning.

Illuminating the sky a crestfallen doleful colour, it appeared the heavens mourned for the state of the land below. Ziriothrax scoffed at the thought.

They who sit above care naught for anything but their own satisfaction. I salivate at the opportunity to tear them down and let them taste the dirt they mock.

Starting with that hateful Mayor. He had dared to lecture me, the Dread Ziriothrax? If it were not for this lumbering dumbo beside me, I would have consigned this entire realm to taste the bitterness of unending despair, as I have done a billion-billion times over!

Or at least he would have tried to. Unknown to him at that moment, a certain suit of armour was having similar thoughts, seemingly unperturbed by Ziriothrax's parting gift of wrath. Well, in case you forgot, he is just a cricket. To be honest, after all this time, Mayor Shade may be getting a bit senile in his old age, taking up a feud with an insect of all things. Silly guy.

Interrupting his thoughts was Jeffbob's voice, soft as though it feared to disturb what lay in this place.

"This is a sad place, cricket. Do not pollute its memory with the corruption of your thought. The land here has already suffered more than enough, and it cries out for help."

His eyes moistened, seemingly lost in thought.

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"War...perhaps it is simply a constant of this cruel world. Wherever life exists there is hierarchy. And with hierarchy comes ambition. Tell me, cricket, is there no solution? Are we simply to repeat the same thing, cycles of hatred and death and renewal and growth, until the decay of all things?"

Ziriothrax did not hide the fire burning within his eyes.

"You see the problem, but you are blind to the solution right in front of your eyes. I will save all universes, by destroying all universes!"

Jeffbob looked into the distant forlornly, not refuting Ziriothrax immediately. Eventually he sighed, muttering as though to himself.

"Perhaps that may be the only solution after all. After all..."

His brow furrowed, his small mind racing as it scrambled to coalesce the fragments of that thought as it scattered in the winds. A spark of himself had been regained, but all that gave him was the urge to collect more. It would still be a long time before he would truly recover himself, whoever that may be.

And so he remained lost in thought, staring out at the desolation. It was vast and unending, spreading from horizon to horizon in its terrible glory.

A battlefield, where unholy things had wreaked their savage fury upon each other, uncaring of the plight of the world they shared. The distant shrieks of vultures added to the bleak ambience, as though nothing remained here but carrion-eaters.

It appeared that one such ambitious specimen had noticed the two figures who had appeared. Its warped mind was incapable of understanding the greater implications of that sudden appearance, fueled only by a singular attraction towards the biomass of their bodies. Behind its red eyes, a corrupted logo of some corporation barely visible, it calculated several dozen variables, coming to the conclusion.

It was hungry, and they were food.

Jeffbob was in a catatonic state, immersed in his ongoing battle against oblivion. Ziriothrax was half tempted to let the vulture attack him, but the possible repercussions of another anti-saniton surge was something even he was not willing to risk.

And so, as the vulture fell from the sky, a hideous construct of machine and flesh, Ziriothrax looked up. His gaze flitted past the pitiful thing, past the blue sun-illuminated sky, penetrating into the void of space.

The piercing laughter of the stars assaulted his ears, but he merely grinned.

"Do not fret, you disgusting things. I will come for you soon enough."

His voice was quiet, but for a moment the stars fell silent. The vulture arrived, having built up speed and momentum like a falling meteor. Yet, just as it was about to collide with Ziriothrax, it stopped as if colliding with an invisible barrier.

For a split second, it was still, as if caught by an invisible hand. Almost immediately, its inertia caught up to it, and it flattened. Red and black and grey matter burst out in a fan like a watermelon hurled against a brick wall.

Its cry had alerted a flock, but upon seeing the fate of its brethren, their rudimentary risk-aversion circuits sparked to life and they dispersed. The remains of their companion was already indistinguishable from the carnage of the battlefield, perhaps a clue to the sheer scale of destruction that occurred in that place.

The resentment that flowed here must run truly deep-

Ziriothrax twitched an antenna, noticing something strange. His minds catalogued the observation silently, adding it to an ever-growing list. Jeffbob's head moved abruptly, gazing down at the remains of the vulture all around them.

At the corner of his misty, blank, lifeless eyes, a single tear formed. As it fell, the setting blue sun shone through its crystal purity, reflecting in myriad colours like unseen, fragmented dimensions.

A flash of purple from Jeffbob's horns, and the two of them left that place behind. At the centre of a ring of fresh blood and metal, that teardrop hit the ground, shed for all those needless deaths.

Somewhere not as deep in the depths of the battlefield, yet no less desolate, a nameless soldier stirred in his slumber.