Destiny Needs a Mediator

Chapter IV

Destiny Needs a Mediator

It was a long flight, it took up to two hours to scale those mountains. As we did so, we told each other stories of our lives before our captures. Drakoserpentis was always a slave. Her egg was found in the bowels of the mountains, a miner mistook her egg as a large gold nugget, and used it to buy his way into Mammon's high order. Although when she hatched Mammon was infuriated to find that his magnificent gold nugget was only a mere dragon egg. Mammon was about to toss the hatchling off the side of the mountain, that is, until he took a moment to examine the golden scales that this dragon provided. 

You see, Mammon draws his power from how wealthy he is. The greater the wealth the greater his strength; this goes for every greedy demon in Hell. In other words if you were born poor you would be taken to Mammon at birth and used for free labor. Once Drakoserpentis reached a reasonable age, Mammon began to pluck her scales and use them for fireproof armor and shields.

I told Drakoserpentis about my family and life in Heaven. I even told her about my father and my job. She didn't seem too interested; until the day my life changed and I ended up down in the depths of Hell, that caught her attention.

Coming closer to the top of the mountains, we heard a guard yell. Suddenly the cliffs echoed with a great WHOOSH! Then a rain of ballista bolts flew from the side. 

I looked towards the bolts, the bolts flew throught the air with a deadly precision. I only noticed how accurate they were once a bolt was about to pierce Drakoserpentis' head.

I held out my hand to try and catch the bolt but instead it burst into flames, the pressure caused the bolt to blow up into smaller pieces. Surprised, I grabbed the tip as it flew past then threw it to send another the fatal blast off course. 

I thought we were safe until we began to spiral downwards! One had hit Dracoserpentis in the wing! We were about to crash when I remembered my wing.

"Drakoserpentis I need you to flap your wings with me or we, will, crash!" she began to flap her wings, So I began to flap mine in unison. This still didn't stop us from crashing, It only softened the fall. We landed in crystal snow. 

Despite being in Hell, it was freezing. The crystals were sharp and painful to land on. I checked around Drakoserpentis and saw massive ballista bolts wedged in her front right wing and roughly, the center of her tail.

"Try to hold still, I have to pull these out."

" Ok just be careful." I pulled the bolt out of her wing and she took a sharp inhale.

"Ok, that's your wing. Time for your tail. I'm gonna try something to seal the wounds, it might hurt a little" I pulled out the bolt in her tail and tested out my newfound control over fire. It took a serious amount of energy; I successfully closed the holes in her wing and tail. The drain in energy caused me to fall to the ground and take a deep breath. "We'll camp out here tonight and wait for your body to fully heal; I can only seal the wounds, not heal them.." So we set up camp. I found some sheep and goats who's skin we would use for tents and the tender meat we'd use for food for the next couple of days, as the day crept on the tents were built and the food was stored in a preservation box. When night came I made a fire for warmth. Above, we could hear horns and music. The music felt as if it were for a comical manner. The horns were loud and annoying. It took over three hours for me to sleep. 

After finally falling asleep, I was once again visited by that warm voice. I was in a dark and empty room where nothing was visible. This time my mouth was uncovered and fully functional. "Who are you? And why do you sound so familiar?" I stared deep into the darkness towards the source of the voice,

"Titanis I am oga' atheal and your dear father." I stood there, untrusting every word,

"No, my fathers dead. Has been for years." I thought long and hard, just thinking of my father made my eyes water.

"I'm sorry son," Claimed the voice, a silent sorrow, filling his calming voice, "I couldn't stay in Heaven forever,but I can prove you're my son." I cocked my head unsure of what was coming, "You were born with my eyes." A flash of light brightened the room revealing a man. I wiped the tears from my eyes and took a long look at the man, he had skin made from stars and was wearing a silk blindfold. As he removed the blindfold, it revealed his pure white pie-cut eyes.

"How do I know you're not just some dream?" I said, poking the man's chest. A great shock jolted my finger from the man's body, "If you really are my father, why did you let mother and I believe you were dead?" I screamed staring deep into the man's endless eyes, "Why'd you do it? I was so young." I whispered to myself, tears once again forming around my eyes.

"Titanis I need you to trust that I have my reasons, and that I have always loved you." He put his hand on my shoulder, wiped my tears and took a deep breath, "My son, you are the only one who can end this war and save humanity."

"Why me?" 

"You are my son, only you have the power to rise atop the ranks and end this war." The man turned away from me and a magic projection began to play an unfamiar scene, "This is a scene from the dawn of time, long before earth was ever populated…" The man held his hand up and fell silent, allowing me to focus on the flashback that was playing above.

"Greetings my creations. You are here to create life; to fill the worlds you see before you." The man turned his hand and the projection faded to black. He looked away from me, and After a few seconds the projection began to play once more

The projection began to play once more. The projection opened up on God, his huge beard flowing past his legs, he was telling a group of early angels the story of creation; I stood there listening intently to the wondrous story, but slowly, I heard things that made no sense whatsoever.

An every laying theme of fear spread from his stories pointing out the seven sins: no Gluttony, Wrath, Envy, Lust, Greed, Pride, or Sloth. Both Humans and select angels found it as their right to indulge in these sins.

Sadly, instead of creating a love and peace filled utopia, it led to rebellion and dystopia. As punishment he sent some of his own children to Hell as fallen angels, to keep them imprisoned and away from humanity, but on earth words spread quickly, and so was the birth of religion. 

The projection stopped for the last time. 

 The man turned towards me and looked me deep in the eyes, "Titanis, sin is a horrible part of humanity," I nodded my head as he continued to speak "Sin, no matter how terrible, is what grants humanity with, just that, humanity. Without sin nothing would be different, the world would be an unadventurous place where achievement wouldn't exist; desires left empty! Which would drive humanity to the brink of insanity." I thought back to my life in Heaven, I followed every rule, every commandment, and what did that get me? Sent to Hell, but in my short time down there I'd never felt more alive.

"I see, without sin there would be no balance between the scales, only purity would reign. Rendering humans helpless and unable to be the humans we've all grown to love. Sins and all." The man smiled and spoke one last time,

"Thank you for understanding. Now it's time for you to wake up and continue your journey. We will talk again after your fight. Good luck and always remember. I love you." I woke up just in time to dodge Drako's falling body. As she fell to the ground, a large cloud of glittering diamond fluttered through the air. Without saying anything, I watched as she tried flying once more.

"Don't strain yourself, we have time. Let yourself heal." She looked down at me and said,

"No more waiting, it's time." she began to fall again, I took a step to the side and walked up to her,

"Are you sure? It's only been a day, you took some nasty hits back there." I said, concerned for both of us,

"No more waiting," She said, dismissing my comment,"I've waited far too long for this. I'm ready." Drakoserpentis rolled over and allowed me to climb atop her back. We took one last look at the crystal snow campsite.

"Let's go." I said as Drako began flying barely above the white gold birch trees. Nearing the platforms atop the mountains, Drako and I landed and began to walk, well I walked. Along the side of the mountain, stood a line of demons waiting to be accepted into the land above.