Generation Arkian

"Are you hurt at all? Sky is going to kill me if you're injured in the slightest," Illya said, looking at my body up and down.

"My muscles are weak... but I'm fine... tell me, what happened to him? What did you do to Zeka?" I asked Illya.

"Simple. Every person has a capacity for the amount of Incarnations they can hold. That's why some people are fairly rated in power. Cole has that healing, Austin has those blades, but Zeka was on another level, because if his strands went into you, he could mimic your ability. He mimics Incarnations, and yours was just deadly enough to kill him," Illya vaguely explained.

"That doesn't exactly help me understand at all... why don't you try that again, if you wouldn't mind?" I asked her, putting my body weight on my rapier stuck in the ground.

"What's hard to understand? Your Incarnation can't be stolen," She explained again.

Was she doing that on purpose?

"Yeah, that. Why is my Incarnation specifically so different than Shike's, or Belle's? I don't get what you mean by 'deadly enough to kill him' either," I told her.

"It's a good thing Sky thinks you're pretty because if it was your intelligence he liked, he'd be as stupid as you," Illya said.

"If I was that stupid, it would still be a better alternative than whatever your crazy bitch ass had in store for him. You know about the past, I don't. Tell me what happened to him," I asked her.

"Sure thing. So, to put it into simple terms for you, Zeka tried to steal your Incarnation. You don't exactly have one... or at least, it's not yours specifically. Your Incarnation belonged to Ali Asterio, who was somebody that made Zeka look like a training dummy. However, it wasn't just because it belonged to her, it's because it was a Pure Blooded Asterio he tried to steal it from," Illya said, blowing on her nails while sitting on Zeka's dead body.

"Pure-Blooded Asterio? I've heard that before, what makes them so powerful exactly? And, am I a Pure-Blooded Asterio?" I asked her next.

"You're not Pure-Blooded, but you are an Asterio. Think of it like this, as the world continues, and kids are born, more generations are added. If you started as a Pure-Blooded Asterio, you are a Generation Zero Arkian. When you have kids, they would be Generation Two Arkians. This continues, on and on, until you hit infinity. The higher the number in Generations, the more powerful the kids are," Illya said. She took a breath, took a swig of water, and dumped some on Zeka's splattered head.

"The kids are more powerful because that power is passed down, generation to generation, and bred, and then passed again. Lia is a Generation Three, which makes her powerful enough to wield White and Red Strands. Her kids would wield Purple, and those kids would wield Gold Strands. That's Five Generations worth of power building just to do what we do," She said. She took another drink of water and then offered me some.

"A Generation Zero Arkian is higher than all. The King of all. Somebody who can pull power and use whatever they can from any amount of time it takes a Generation to learn. Sky has the equivalent strand control of a Generation Five Arkian, but he is Generation Zero because there is no Generation Stronger than him. The Pure-Blooded Asterio doesn't need to wait between generations, and neither will his children," Illya said. She smiled at that word, and kind of made me uncomfortable.

"So what does that have to do with what happened to Zeka exactly?" I asked her.

"A Generation Two Arkian tried to steal from a Generation Zero. Do you know why that's a problem?" Illya asked me. I was finally able to see where she was coming from.

"Yeah. Generation Two can't steal from Generation Zero because it's too much. It's Generationally bigger than Generation Two can handle... but, why am I able to handle that Gravity Incarnation?" I asked her next.

"You can handle the Singularity Incarnation because you haven't really used it yet. You've used it in bursts. Remember how Ali used it to raise the ground up and destroy things on a major scale? That's the Singularity Incarnation. You can just wield Gravity like a weapon, and that's all you're meant to do," Illya told me again.

"I guess I won't ask for more... but I'm grateful in understanding now. So... why can I use Golden Strands then? Does that make me a Generation Five?" I tried to clear up my confusion, sitting next to Illya on Zeka's dead body.

"No, you're an Asterio. They surpass most generational bounds but aren't stronger than the Pure-Bloods," She finished. She got up off Zeka and helped me up, pulling out her radio.

"Zeka is down for the count. Dead. Any updates on what to do next?" Illya asked into the radio.

"Where is his body?" Sky's voice appeared over the radio.

"Watch for the flare," Illya nonchalantly said, shooting it up in the air while covering her ear with the radio.

Right before it even hit the top of a nearby tower, Sky jumped down from another one, slamming into the ground while bending his knees, and walking over to the body.

His look was... unnaturally angry.

"Dani, are you okay?" He asked me. The look faded, and sincerity was in his eyes as he put his hand on Zeka.

"I'm okay... are you?" I asked him.

"Incarnation of Transfer," Sky mumbled, letting golden strands flow from Zeka's body, into his own.

"Oh? You learned that trick too... good, I was just about to explain it to you," Illya interrupted my question with her own.

Sky's voice was low when he began to explain the situation.

"Cole escaped from my grasp. He's only running, but I wanted Zeka's ability before I continued. I'll be going now... and I'm okay, I'm just ready for the fighting to be over," Sky said.

He summoned a golden saber and started running away.

Illya and I both noticed it, but the saber had black strands surrounding the golden innards now...