The Great War (part 1)

"The whole world can become the enemy when you lose what you LOVE."

Kristina McMorris-

Bridge of Scarlett Leaves

"Sir you cannot go beyond this point, her majesty is not in favor of any visitors"

"Sir I said sto..."

Just then the guard who was approaching M from the right was instantly reduced to dark red sludge which splattered like paint across the decorative drapes and marble status along the Great Hall leading to the Throne room. The second royal guard which was now on one knee in a proper display of humility was silent as M stormed past.

"I don't know what to do, I can't hardly believe that all of this is happening in my lifetime"

M was silent and when he finally reached the massive double doors he placed one hand on its cold surface and the other over his bowed head and began to weep softly. The Mightiest General that the Kingdom of hell could conjure, the former seraphim Marcellus was stricken by grief and uncertainty. He recalled memories of the past, which before entering the throne room he knew he must reconcile. Fear and sadness gripped him tightly, though he knew that going through all of his thoughts and memories was a necessity if he wanted to comfort his grieving wife.

The last time he felt this way was the day his own father, the god of light Atticus cast him out of heaven along with legions of angels which opposed the use of souls as energy. The pain he felt then was unimaginable, the words Atticus spoke as he laid waste to a quarter of his legion of 1,000,000,000,000 angels still lay heavily on his heart. Atticus spoke thus.

"As you were created by me, but for entertainment by which you existed, now thy minions shall become tools for the progressive advancements of war. Now become sustenance by which you then will combine with the souls to satiate my insatiable hunger for power."

The words pierced his heart, for being created by God as the first angel of the throne, and the accompanying destruction of his younger brothers and sisters who could not understand or those who couldn't escape in time clouded his heart and mind in dark rage. Though occurring at about 1,000,000,000 years ago, the first great war which really was more of a one sided massacre still remained as an open wound for those who experienced it first-hand. Since then the angels were subject to the whims of the universe and found a place in a dimension that consisted of an enormous planet with six smaller though agreeably large satellites. Soon the "fallen" fostered the development of this plant which was in the prime distance between itself and the moderate star it accompanied. The radiation was abundant from the perspective of the creation of life. Living creatures began to flourish in the salty liquid which pooled in large amounts over most of the planets surface. Marcellus at this point retained the title of prince, the other angels cast away their former oppressive titles of angels and created a new kingdom for them all to be apart of. Thus Hell was born, not as a place but as a group made up of individuals who believe that with unity and understanding comes peace and power and they named themselves demons in an antithesis to the gods. Marcellus was proud, his people were united and under his instruction this little speck of rock began to harbor life from which it seemed impossible. He set about commanding the more powerful of his brothers and sisters to begin to rotate the nickel and iron core of their home so that it would spin. This in turn rotated the planet and allowed for all of it to be illuminated in an equal amount to the darkness. Marcellus, throughout this whole process, defended the planet from cosmic disruption and intense solar energy that had originally bombarded the planets surface.

The planet reaching an equilibrium, began to produce a magnetic field of its own and Marcellus set about studying the abundance of organic matter which now began to populate the whole surface of the planet. Having the ability to retain his full power allowed him to look outward, his lesser born family began to warn him about the fact that this new planet had not cleared its orbit around the star and was basically sitting in the middle of a shooting gallery. Marcellus was unbelievably happy, his family working together created a funny thing called math which was able to predict astrological events far before they cam to fruition. Apparently rocks were approaching the planet in a way that it would bypass the satellite moons and use their mass to accelerate. The ability to stop them was achievable by even the lowest born demons, but understanding that this was a natural phenomenon directly related to the universe's infinite order and chaos Marcellus decided to observe this incredible natural force. The asteroids fell upon the young planet with an incredible force the likes of which had never occurred in the dimension that harbored the planets of the gods. The distribution of these immense objects was random and some missed or fell upon one of the six moons. A surprisingly large asteroid impacted tje planet and from that day on the planet held a slight tilt on its axis of top to bottom. After a couple million years as the planet cleared its orbit, what was left from the impacts caused life to begin to grow exponentially. Soon a thin atmosphere formed and changes on the planet created seasons.

Within the time that this was occurring magic from the demons altered the life and began to create larger organisms. Soon large and vicious creatures populated the oceans and landmass, these unconscious disgusting beings had neither intellectual capacity or emotions. Marcellus knew that the spirit powers refused to make homes within the creatures so he devised a plan to re-establish order on this planet. He called down a mighty asteroid, he ordered the demons to keep safe the life which contained the ability to evolve into palpable vessels for the spirits to inhabit. This was something that Marcellus debated within himself, though finally he could not all a beautiful planet to remain a place of death and horror. Tiny mammalian creatures were chosen by the demons because of their simplicity and ability to adapt and evolve in almost every environment on this planet. Once they were moved into a protected dimension Marcellus pulled an asteroid from an orbit far beyond the planet and hurled it into the planet thus destroying all life on the planet. For the reference in time, this was considered to be the last extreme extinction event in the history of the evolution of what came to be known as the human species. Humans were the ideal vessels for the spirits to inhabit and once the mammals achieved sentient brains the spirits combined with them and created a soul. The human species accelerated its own development and multiplied its population by exponential factors shortly there after. This though attracted the gods who longed for a substance that could increase their lifespan and they had observed the "fallen" closely because of their new ability to manipulate a power called magic. Magic was a combination of leftover spirit matter and the powere that they received being born in the divine realm. Demons could now reproduce, gain knowledge and experience, developed emotions and new abilities which began to concern the gods. Now because of the demons gains in tremendous power, the gods couldn't just simply poach the souls on earth (a name for the planet that humans created). Not only were the gods unable to hold sway over the humans because of the demons protection, there was another force within the universe in which strange and powerful beings began to emerge. These "others" as they were first called were omnipotent beings unconcerned with the dealings of either heaven or hell. In fact all they did was watch the humans and when one died, it guided the soul into the right domain. If the soul had believed in God or gods it would be sent to heaven, if there was no faith then the soul was sent to hell. Simple....

Heaven roughly acquired a third of the souls which were judged. Though these souls were very powerful on average because of how faith works there were not as many of them. Plus each soul in heaven was assigned to a particular god while the souls sent to hell were on average weaker, were nonetheless in a greater number and were selected democratically by the large ruling "families" in hell. This made the gods furious because of the smaller quantities in heaven they had to almost fight or join one another just to receive power from the already small number of souls. The gods then began to dissolve the souls and turned the power of the soul into a divine essence which they consumed and in turn increased their power which could be shared with the angels which swore their allegiance after the first great war. Heaven began sending souls back down to earth as beings called messiah, priests, anointed ones, prophets and so on. They carried divine power and influenced humans by performing miracles and made promises of eternal life and prosperity in heaven that was, in effect, reserved for the truly faithful. They were lies, damn good ones at that. Though now with a seemingly unlimited power source, the gods waged an endless campaign against Hell. To make it worse, Heaven would launch surges encroaching on Hells dimension. These surges were generally random but always had new weapons and different tactics which began to mix Heaven's dimension with Hell's creating a battlefield on an intergalactic scale and here is where they fought on an endless destroyed plane which seemed to now be shifting against Marcellus and his beloved family.

As M stood before the throne room he was pondering to himself.

"Are we fools, will Hell be destroyed"

M knew this was the fifth time in the past billion years that Heaven amassed enough power to surge once more. Throwing angels and souls in to the grinding teeth of war. Though will this be the last time.

"How did it all come to this".

M wiped his face, took in a couple deep breaths and pushed through the doors. He must now bring all the words of his people to the new queen. Upon crossing the threshold of the throne room he was swallowed up by infinite darkness.

M was now floating through a dimension that was called the voide. This is where Cleopatra was first seen. Apparently a younger god passed through the void to get to earth for the purpose to identify any potential use of its resources for Heaven. This occurred about five billion years before the first great war, though no one believed him. This god was not really a significant power and sided with Marcellus during the first great war and was lucky enough to become escape from Heaven. His mission was then to guide the angels who were now fallen and in distress. His kind words and ability to lead carried weight with all of the fallen and thus was elected to be their first King in the newly established Hell. Marcellus asked to become his apprentice and studied under him for the duration of the creation of earth, the foundation of the dimension that Hell now resides. Though a secret mission only known to the both of them was to find that rogue God. Marcellus set out every thousand years or so and searched the dark interstellar space. He continued his work all through the first 4 Great Wars. In the middle of the 4th and 5th wars his search was considered to be in vain and it seemed as though peace would last. Though his last search was destined to bear fruit.

Marcellus advanced through a multidimensional rift which was unusually powerful, generating immeasurable gravity waves coming from seemingly owhere. That's when a black nebulae overwhelmed him and he became lost in an infinite darkness. Fearing for his safety he projected his magnetic power as far and as powerful as he could, this blew apart an incredibly large section of the ionized dust cloud. His heart leaped when his gaze fell upon the center of this ancient nebulae. Lying in the center covered only with the silky particles ,what almost seemed to be a river of the ionized gases flowed around her naked body. Marcellus was unbelievably happy though very cautious. Not only did he find a rogue goddes with an unknown power, but where she lay sleeping was of great concern. This young woman was floating through a maze of ionized gas, as though that weren't enough, surrounding her were orbs of light. They were incredibly heavy orbs which were giving off the same magnetic and gravitational forces you would expect a full blown star to be giving off. This was a problem, Marcellus realized these orbs were compressed stars still in their infancy which gave them a multitude of color and sizes but not one was bigger than a baseball. Marcellus was in awe of their sheer number which must have reached into the thousands. Marcellus finally regained his composure and traveled over to the sleeping girl.

"Ah... excuse me ma'am "

"Cleo please excuse me "

M thought of the first time that they met, though they were married now and even conceived a child together, she was still that fragile young woman he met many years ago. He recalled the happiness that she experienced when he woke her from her deep slumber. He also remembered how his mentor, the first king of Hell, the god of life Alistair treated her like his own child once she settled into living in Hell. Now it was Marcellus time to make a fateful report to the new Queen of Hell.

"Cleo its me"

"I know my words can not make sense to you, rather I would like to at least be able to hold you for just a few moments".

The fledgling Queen knew what had to be said and approved of Marcellus decision to transmit the information in the form of emotions. These emotions could then be shared by physical touch or a direct link between souls.

M floated through the darkness which had been

her home for the past 10 billion years. The orbs of light which had continued to grow as long as he knew her were now hidden within the black gases. Some could be seen peeking through the gas giving the surrounding space an ominous glow. Marcellus reached out and pulled Cleo to his chest, holding her tightly in his arms he then felt her begin to cry. A light shake with each sob and accompanying breath hurt his heart. The information is such.

"King Alistair has died in combat, the stolen child was fed to the grotesque monsters within the bowels of Heaven's research dimension alive as a sacrifice. The child's soul was consumed and therefore destroyed and unable to be reincarnated back into the universe's infinite cycle of life. The Kingdom of Hell now rests upon your shoulders. All hail her Majesty, first Queen of Hell Cleopatra."

Marcellus could feel the flood of emotions pouring into Cleo's soul. Her body shook with rage and sorrow, the power she began to display in a natural expression of utter grief was now becoming too much for Marcellus to handel with his magnetic field. Though he was aware of the runaway chain reaction that seemed to be inevitable, Marcellus pulled her into his embrace with all of his might.

"No matter what happens, I will never let you go."

"kill"

"destroy"

"annihilate"

"leave nothing left"

Cleopatra was aware of the things that Marcellus came to tell her before he even entered the throne room. How could she not. The one who took her in and raised her, along with a beautiful child who was still innocent were horrifically murdered and wrenched from her hands in the same day. The heartache was unbearable and now the power within her that was slumbering had been roused and was furious.

"KILL"

Though M was doing the best that he could to reach out to her, it could not compare to the raw power surging forth from deep within the goddes he was holding.

"Protection"

With this one word M was flung in to a protected dimension. Cleo sighed as the tears kept falling from her eyes. She then realized that she was not in control any longer. Black horns became visible atop her head in stark contrast to her blond hair. Her crimson eyes began to glow like hot embers. Then at the tip of her horns a black halo appeared and it was accentuated by 7 dimonds pointing outward from the halo. Her body began to crackle with visible blood red and black lighting. Looking more like a beast each second she developed fangs which were an impressive sight. Her arms were braced against her body as if she were curling something heavy on each side of her body. Her knees were slightly bent from extreme pressures now being exerted upon her. Stretching out from her fingers were black razor sharp claws. Cleo was no longer a queen of poise and grace or even recognizable to anyone who could have seen her. No.

She was now the harbinger of doom, the 15th divine power, a destroyer.

The goddes of Death Cleopatra

M was aware of what was going on, though powerless to intervene. The protected space he was in could offer a way to see out, though until the caster released the dimension from its power source no one could escape. M watched as the goddes turned into a living nightmare that was dripping with power and fury. To those who knew of this ability, which hardly any did or else the betrayal of the King and the offering up of their baby for a sacrifice would never have been attempted, they called this state of transformation the universe's answer to infinite order... "Chaos"

As if obeying a silent order the nebulae came to life with a display of lightning, the black clouds started billowing and rolling. Almost 80 light-years across on a horizontal plane and the same on the vertical, this mass of darkness was turned into a living light show. M was able to watch this from the center of the clouds of ionized gas and dust. What he saw was unimaginable. The orbs of light began to collapse into a tiny space between Cleo's outstretched arms. The orbs were packed one on top of the other fusing rapidly into a strange dark purple ball that began to crackle with what seemed to be red and black lighting just like what was going on within the massive nebulae.

M was waiting for what felt like eternity. Cleo's power was growing exponentially and he knew that if she kept fusing the hydrogen and then holding the reaction with a gravity field, that it would soon begin to cause irreparable damage to her divine body.

Suddenly the orb that was about as small as a golf ball expanded and consumed her body in an intense flash which blinded M. As the light dimmed he gazed upon a spectacular sight. Instead of the monster that he had witnessed in less than a second ago, before him was a beautiful woman covered in a whispy cloak of darkness, the black halo was now a shimmering black crown. The horns were now longer and produced a purple hue from the depths of the smooth black surface. Her eyes were now on fire with a crimson glow and she produced magnificent wings from her back which were black as well. Though what was probably most impressive was the huge scythe clutched in her hands, though large it really wasn't that imposing. Marcellus knew though, that this weapon which was glowing white with heat and producing those strange electrical discharges of red and black, was the most powerful creation in their known universe. Before he could think about what he was viewing Cleo cleaved space in two with a simple sideways movement and released enough energy that a rift was born, she passed through immediately and within a 10th of a second she was gone.

M was silent, since Cleo left the protected space he was basically trapped in dissipated and he was now floating in interstellar space wandering what he should do now. Their was an obvious thought that drifted through his mind.

"Just stay here"

M knew that Cleo was going to the Prison Tower which was housing those that betrayed the former King and then kidnapped the baby. Though M was aware of what was about to transpire within its mighty fortress walls.

"Heh he he this will show them how foolish they were"

M knew he was safer where he was floating around in space, but this wasn't an option. The woman he loved and his whole family of Hell were in grave danger. M took in a deep breath and let it out slowly, he knew what he had to do and his resolve was not going to waiver.

"Open Now!!!"

He shouted and immediately a rift tore open in front of him. Dawning his General's armor which was forged in the depths of Hell's foundries he traveled through time and space. He prayed silently for guidance and support not for himself but for Cleopatra.

He did not know it at the time, but his prayers were going to be answered sooner than expected and in a way which will change the course of of the past and the future.