Keepers: Blood of The Fallen (12 page)

I stood up, picked Berni up, and sat her on the side of the hall next to a statue of some guy. I couldn’t do anything else at the moment. Just like the other guys we lost, we had to say goodbye and keep moving. We made it to the source chamber, and I peeked inside. There, I saw Tana, Cilandria, Kneulton, and Asia. Tana was tied up by a chain on the far end of the room, while Asia was inside of the source extractor box. Asia looked like she was in so much pain. I turned to Tyler and told him to get his machete ready, along with a quick explanation of what was going on in the room. He said he was ready, so we went in with our weapons drawn.

“NO!” Kneulton shouted. Then, he seemed to appear in front of me, instantly. “You cannot stop this process now. Can’t you see? She is the one. She is the Keeper we needed all this time.”

I picked my daggers up in an attempt to swing at him, but he was too quick. He put his hands on my wrists and pushed them back down. I stomped on his foot as hard as I could. That was when I realized he was only quick if he could anticipate my moves. I had to be unpredictable. I wanted to damage his legs, so that he couldn’t move as fast on them. As soon as he looked at me again, I kicked my leg out as hard as I could, aiming at his shin. He ran right into it. The force of the blow knocked me back against the wall, causing me to hit my head.

As I heard bells and whistles and saw blurry humanoids around me, I shouted to Tyler to help Tana. I cleared my eyes and saw that he was already ahead of me. Cilandria just stood there, staring at Asia. It seemed like she was either conflicted or just really focused on draining Asia. “Cilandria, don’t do this. She’s your friend. She saved your life.”

Then, Kneulton stumbled to his feet. He had a severely broken leg. The bone was sticking out. I had brought him down to my level. His hands were still lethally quick, but if I could keep him at a distance, he couldn’t beat me.

I stood in front of Tyler and Tana, trying to protect them from him. I knew he was afraid of us having the larger numbers, so I was sure he was willing to kill any, if not all, of us. Luckily for us, I managed to maim him. He couldn’t move nearly as fast as he could at full health. However, due to his unimaginable speed, he was still just as fast as I was on my two good legs. Hoping that Tyler would finish getting Tana out of her restraints, I stepped towards Kneulton with both daggers in hand. Standing two inches from his face, I said into his ear, “If you’re supposed to be a Keeper, but destroy entire populations of people, what are you keeping?”

He didn’t answer my question, but he instead said, “Earth was your responsibility. You…and your friends’.” Then I stepped back. He came forward, and I drove both daggers into his abdomen. His eyes grew wide, and I could feel his muscles contract and detract around the blades. He tried to speak, but I twisted the daggers, causing him to nearly lose consciousness. I pushed them in harder, and he fell to the ground. I took the daggers out of his body, and he let out a loud grunt.

I turned to Tana and Tyler, he had finally managed to pick the lock on the chain, just as I turned. I looked at Asia, and I could see her face still showing an enormous amount of pain. I was in a zone that blocked out all sound: soundproof tunnel vision. I had to save Asia. I walked over to the chamber that Asia was in and opened it. She fell out of the box, into my arms. Upon contact, I could feel a jolt of electricity course throughout my entire body. I knew she was suffering in that box, and it was not anything I wanted for anybody ever again.

Asia’s mace was in the corner next to the box. After she started supporting her own weight, I let her stand, and I grabbed the mace. I went to the back of the box and hit it as hard as I could. I had to hit it four or five times, before I put a dent in it. Then, I hit it several more times, before I finally pierced it. I hit the pipe that ran from the back of the box next, destroying it in one blow. When I finished, I walked out from behind the box and saw Cilandria kneeling next to Kneulton, who was still gasping and hanging on to what little life was left.

She rubbed his face with her hand. “It’s ok. Try to concentrate,” she said to Kneulton. Then, his wounds started to heal.

“Cilandria, what are you doing?!” Tana screamed.

“I can’t let him die,” she said in a calm voice.

“Why? He tried to kill us,” Asia added.

“But…I love him.”

I knew it. I had the feeling all along. She was supporting that monster the entire time, or even worse, he was supporting her, and she was the real monster. I started walking towards her, daggers in hand. Just then, the door to the room slammed open. It was Xavier. He had blood on his shirt, but it wasn’t his. He was crying—because of Berni, I was sure—and he seemed prepared to fight some more. He stepped into the room and without hesitation, he hit Cilandria in the face with a metal pipe. Tyler ran in and grabbed Xavier. They left the room. “I told Xavier to hit anyone that wasn’t us,” I said. “Cilandria, if you’re not one of us, you’re one of them.”

Cilandria lay still next to Kneulton on the floor. Kneulton’s wounds in his stomach were gone. His leg was still very much broken. “You’re going to pay for this, Moses. I didn’t want to hurt you, but you leave me no choice.” He tried to stumble to his feet but fell back onto his butt. He wasn’t a threat anymore, but I could feel something creeping up inside of me. I could feel the darkness start to takeover, like it had in the past. I hadn’t felt the feeling since I fought Brama. I didn’t even feel it during my fight with Iron; I only felt anger then.

I couldn’t let him live. I pulled the third dagger from my belt and threw it at him. He caught it. The blade cut his hand deeply, and there was a lot of blood oozing through his fingers. I noticed that, and I felt the urge to kill him grow inside of me because of it. I felt Asia’s hand grab my arm, but I yanked my arm away from her. I wasn’t going to let him live. He deserved to die, and I deserved to kill him.

When he threw the blade down, I walked over to him and knelt down. I reached into my pocket and pulled out the vial of acid. I stuck one of the daggers into the side of his neck and watched the blood pour out down the blade. Then, I looked him in his eyes and poured the acid on the top of his head. I watched, as it burned through his hair, scalp, skull, and finally into his brain. Then, I yanked the dagger back out of his neck and pushed him over.

I checked Cilandria for a pulse. She was still alive, but her pulse was very slow. I grabbed her by the back of her collar and dragged her over to the chains that once bound Tana. After I put her in the restraints, I turned to look at the terrified faces of the people I went into the temple with. Asia and Tana looked at me with looks of terror but also concern. Tyler and Xavier watched from the hallway. Tyler was mortified, but Xavier still looked angry. Xavier’s look was the only look, in that moment, which felt like the right look.

Asia walked over to me, reaching for my hand. She took the bloody dagger from me. I had no intention of using it again anyway. Cilandria jerked awake. We all turned and looked at her. I’m sure I looked at her with discontent, but the others, excluding Xavier, looked at her with care. I wanted her to explain herself. “Well?” I asked.

“What? There’s nothing to talk about, just go,” she responded.

Asia wasn’t happy with Cilandria’s response. She walked up to her and said, “Tell us why you allowed him to take out an entire planet, or I will never be able to trust you again.” Cilandria told us that the original plan was to bring everyone on Earth to Alburia, so that their source energy could be harvested. She assumed that plan was scrapped, in favor of another one that involved taking a few select fallen Keepers from Earth and harvesting their energy. The problem was that the fallen Keepers had to know they were Keepers in the first place. They had to figure out a way to let the fallen Keepers know they had abilities.

“Without a Keeper’s abilities, the source harvesting would be meaningless. Dormant abilities are not harnessed through the source chamber; they are left behind with the body. Only active abilities may pass through the source chamber with the source energy.”

“The book…” I said, thinking of the very first book that Tana and I opened.

“Yes, the book you and Santana found was one of several. Santana is not truly a fallen Keeper, because she did not denounce the role of the Keeper wholeheartedly, but even if she were a fallen Keeper, her source energy would do us no good. We found that out just before you’d taken her. That is why we did not stop you. She would have had to be born a fallen Keeper. Fallen Keepers are the only beings in the universe without restrictions, other than the Kavars of course. Like Kavars, fallen Keepers who are born a part of the fallen do not have limits on their power. You have the ability to destroy an entire world.” She looked at me piercingly, directly in the eyes, and then she looked at Asia. “Asia was the one…” she said, while still looking into Asia’s eyes.

“Why? Why did you need her energy? Who or what were you trying to create? That poor being that kept dying over and over…that was sick,” Tana said.

Tyler went over to the box with the mold inside and started inspecting it. Cilandria didn’t answer us. She just stared at Asia. I saw Tyler wipe his hand on the tiny window in front of the box, then he fell back, seemingly in disbelief. “There’s a guy in there!” He said, frantically. I looked at Cilandria, then I walked over to the box. There was a man inside. He had markings on his face that looked like tribal tattoos. His eyes were closed, and I assumed he was dead.

I opened the box, and he fell out. I tried to catch him, but he was dead weight and far too heavy for me. We hit the floor, and I rolled him over on his back, gently. Tana walked over and said, “That’s him! That’s the man you’ve tried to create so many times. Looks like you failed again.” I felt his pulse on his neck, and I could feel a slow pulse. I wasn’t going to tell Cilandria that though.

I stood up and asked her who he was. She just closed her eyes and hung her head, as she still hanged from the chains around her wrists. I could see tears dropping from her face. I looked back at the man on the ground. “He has on clothes. How? He didn’t have clothes on in the video. Tana, did he ever have clothes, when they failed before?”

“No. He was always naked.”

I didn’t want to see him naked, so I didn’t argue, but I had a feeling that something was very wrong about him having clothes.

“Asia spent so much time building her chi. It was the one power she loved the most.” Cilandria smiled and looked Asia. “She is so powerful that we knew she was the key. She would be the key to bring him back. We had no intention of killing you, Asia. We needed you. I have cared for you deeply, ever since the day we met. He is everything we are. Without him, we would not exist. Many people refer to him as God.”

“Are you telling me that he is supposed to be God? God isn’t dead.” I said.

“No. No. He is not God, but he is a creator. He is the High Order’s creator. We created your ancestors. We are basically your descendants, and he is ours.”

“How did he die? If he’s a creator, he should be able to survive anything, right?”

“No…when he created each of us, he gave up parts of his power to us. I have the power to heal others and myself. I wasn’t there when he died… He gave the power to control time to Binitai. The power of speed to Kneulton, and the power to create others, effortlessly, to Charon. Lastly, he gave his ability to take away other Keepers’ powers to Vincent. He only retained three powers for himself: the power to restore life, the power to control those he restored, and the power to absorb source energy, by just a simple touch…” She smiled. “He could only be brought back by a pure blood Keeper. That is why we lost all of the other Kavars over time. I am sorry, Moses. You really are the last of your kind.”

“So you killed the other Kavars, trying to bring this guy back to life? What a waste…” I said. I didn’t care that I was the last Kavar, though. I only cared about not letting that guy wake up. I couldn’t allow him to wake up if he would be just like the rest of them. I walked over to the guy and once again took a knee next to him. I took my other dagger from my belt. I could feel my power returning—that was definitely Vincent’s blood on Xaviers shirt—and I started to embrace the darkness again. I reached up high and brought the dagger down as hard as I could to the man’s chest.

The dagger went into his chest like a hot knife though butter. His eyes suddenly opened, his irises were orange and vibrant. He took in a huge gasp of air. My hand was still pressing the dagger down into his chest, but he stood up anyway. He tried to speak, but he couldn’t. He looked me in the eyes, wildly. He then looked at Cilandria. She stared back at him. Blood was just starting to ooze from his chest. As soon as the blood touched my hand, I could see tiny lightning bolts streaking in his eyes. He grabbed my wrist, and it seemed like touching me gave him a jolt of life.

He flung me backwards. I crashed into the other extractor. He stumbled over to Cilandria, letting out deep-voiced grunts. She touched his face and healed his wound. His chest pushed the dagger out, and then he kicked the dagger over to me. “Keep it. You will need it,” he said in a very deep, menacing, and intimidating voice. He looked at Cilandria and said, “It is almost time. But I am not yet ready.” Then, he grabbed Cilandria by the throat and choked her, with one hand. Her eyes were staring into his. “You left me to be with those creatures. You cannot be trusted, because you trust them. Goodbye, my child.” We heard a snap, then Cilandria’s head fell to the side.

Asia screamed, “No!”