Welcome to Gaia! ::

Honestly, the Western Gaia military barracks, a small office, being a Lieutenant amounted to something she supposed. Let's see, paperwork, a completed report on the on the medical supply situation, didn't Sallea need that for the inventory check? She pushed back her chair and stood up, taking the thirty page report in hand. It was good to be tall again, but why was she thinking that? Tall.... again? Enough of this nonsense, she had a late report to deliver that she had been working on non-stop all morning. She opened her office door, expecting to find the main lobby where the various staff officers had their cubicles set up. Instead she steped out into a void, a deep black void. The door slammed shut behind her before she could get back to her office, the papers slipped from her hands. No longer a fully grown woman in an officers uniform, she was a little girl in violet dress.

"Hello!"

Her voice echoed again and again. Each step echoed a clap throughout the void. In this strange place she could walk, she could see herself, but everything around her was dark, except for one small faint light.

"Welcome to the void, little girl."

She approached timidly, finding an old man sitting in a rocking chair, relaxing with a cigar. His hair was silver, his eyes were silver, and he was cold. The void around him was refrigerated. The cigar burnt blue, quite brightly. Smoke wafting from the burning end didn't get very far before falling as ice crystals. The smoke snow fell through void, far below wher she was standing. It made her wander how she was standing.

"Where am I? Who are you? Why are you in my dream?"

I've been waiting for you to find this place. you came rather sooner than I expected. Much more than meets the eye with you little human, much more.

"Who are you!"

"A mere personification of something beyond the scale of your limited imagination, the unification with of which you rejected. I once thought of projecting a younger image, but I like to remain versatile, and I find that projecting an image of seniority suits my prestige. I am the oldest being in the universe afterall."

" question "

" stare "

" question "

"You aren't very bright, are you kid, typical nurse," he said, shaking the ashes from his cigar before taking a deep buff and blowing the smoke in her face. "I'm just a lonely old man who needed someone to talk to, you'll have to forgive me if I ramble on about nonsense now and then. My powers of articulation are quite limited, seeing as I barely have enough power to project a humble personification toward the edge of this void. Anyway, I don't bite. I'm quite harmless, just a lonely old man."

"I'm sorry about that, being lonely and all, is there anything I can do to help?"

"Nothing, I can deal with it though, my problem isn't nearly as bad as yours," he said, staring off into the void, far past her. "Maybe you can let an old man know what's going on in your life, keep me company, every now and then. God knows you'll have the time."

"Oh, I'm just helping Evan find something that someone lost. And my problem, you mean being a kid," she said nervously, "I can handle it. It isn't so bad."

The old man laughed knowingly, having an idea what was on the back of her mind.

"No, your problem is much, much, worse. Everyone you've ever known will die. Generations will pass away. Cities and nations will rise and fall. And through it all, you'll still be a mere child. Then there is the scaring, think of all the scars you'll acumulate in a few thousand years, in ten thousand. By the time you are seventeen for appearance sake, you'll be the most hideous in exisistence, an unwanted pariah among your kind. You might as well go now and give yourself to the undead, or simply commit suicide. You'd be better off."

She gasped. He hadn't bothered to tell her that any scar would fade, and that in her condition even the deepest scars would shrink and disapear after a few hundred years.

"You like the prospect of gaining knowledge over time, but even if you take it slow you'll have mastered every study mankind can offer. There will be nothing left to learn, and you'll be left without even that distraction. And if you think your little bird is going to take care of you forever, think again, one of you will grow bored with the other and that will be all. Better yet, maybe some interesting fate will cause the avian spy a reunification with his master in Hades."

"What's wrong with you old man!?" Melissa yelled, "Why are you so mean! Why are you saying these mean things?!"

"I was once content to live off milk and rest in contement, spawning my brood as I pleased. My body spanned Gaia, in fact, the world you live in now is my rotting corpse. I am the ultimate undead, and you mortals are nothing more than bugs and maggots feeding off my flesh. How would you feel if you were torn asunder for no good reason, and your body made into a home for those who murdered you! Yes, I'm a mean bitter old being, but I have good reason. Ragnorok couldn't kill me, because technically, I'm already dead. The only way to destroy me, is too destroy Gaia itself."

"Is that what you wanted all along? To destroy Gaia, because you want to die?"

The old man laughed, gesturing with his hands as he spoke, "My little human, a corpse feels no pain, and I know someday this world will end. Even you will be dead long before that. I just wanted to have an avatar, be able to do some things, have some company, boss mortals around. Is that so wrong? I had no malevolent plans. Unfortunately, I need to merge with a human in order to do that. You would have been perfect, child, but for some reason you refused me."

"Because you're evil, I don't know why you're evil but you are. Maybe you weren't always evil, but you are now. I sensed it. You'll just have to settle for being sealed here."

"Oh, I will child, I really don't have any other choice in the matter, now do I. Tell Evan I do hope he finds whatever it is he's looking for. Wish him luck for me."

The old man smiled wickedly, freaking her out before he disintigrated into a pile of ice crystals.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In her bed, Melissa mumbled nervously as she tossed and turned. Her blanket was strewn across her bed, but she did seem to be stirring.

Meanwhile, at the fight -

Sutiiven took a chance, and rushed towards Staccato whilst he was shifting his iron bar. He came into Staccato's side with his right hand blade, practically spinning his entire body in attempt to come around and hit with the left hand sword as well. He was vulnerable to anything that threw him off balance, so if Shuyin decided to launch an earthquake causing attack or something similar, he was screwed.