Epilogue:
I was only a kid then, hell I didn’t know what would happen that day, nobody knew what would happen that day. It started out just fine and simple, me, a 12 year old girl living on the planet of Zurishian with my humble family who did nothing but get by because they were the only farmers in a 20 mile radius. Looking back on it I simply laugh at how I thought everything was humble and peaceful. Weird now though. Was it peaceful when my mother came home late at night with an extra hundred dollars in her hand because she had slept with a man who was certainly not my father? Was it peaceful when my brother and sister would have to be beaten black and blue for being so small and helpless from my drunken father who was still living through the horrors from the last war we had?. And then there was me, Ember J Forwiz,in the middle of all the abuse and sadness thinking that it would all be okay soon, that it would get better. Oh how foolish I was, I was only a child, and the horrors were only just beginning.
Chapter the first:
I'm not very good at telling stories, whether it be i'm not as good as Mr Shakespere, or I don’t like talking about me and my life on the run I don’t know, but i'll do my best to recall. It was a Sunday afternoon in the village, there were some markets up and children running around but it felt more quiet than usual as me and my family strolled through to buy our weekly things. I was wearing my favorite outfit that day, for really no particular reason, a beautiful maroon colored wool sweater and a black u neck shirt underneath. I was wearing a hand-me-down skirt from my older sister but I didn’t care. I thought it beautifully matched my sweater. “The usual ugly look for today sis?” my brother Buckey had said with a chuckle before we headed out the door of our house. At least I don’t look like dog shit I would’ve said back to him mocking him for his crooked teeth and ugly curly hair, but I thought better since my father was beside us. My sister and brother quickly strayed away from the rest of our family after a while. They’ve probably gone to steal food or something again, I thought, do they not learn they’re lesson from Father?. “Ember” I was suddenly pulled from my thoughts from the croak of my fathers voice, “I don’t want you to do anything foolish today do you understand?” he said it as a warning and I took it as one, I must admit I had done some stupid things for attention recently. “Yes father, I'm sorry” I said looking down. Mother had gone to go get groceries at the other side of town so it was just me and him for a while until she came back and we walked back home. “Your mother has mentioned how you have a friend in the village here” Vivi I thought, I had been seeing her for a full rotation of the moon cycles and more, she was so kind and sweet and an amazing friend, she had given me kindness when I did not think any other pig in my family village would.”What about her?” I asked, I was so close to my father like a moth to a flame, I could smell his cheap cologne he always put on to try and mask out the stench of his beer and whisky. He spoke without even looking up “You can go see her if you’d like to Em,I don’t care at all really I’d like for you to be gone and out of my way and sight”. Harsh but not too harsh as he’d been harsher before, and he said I could go to my friends house so that was a plus. At the time I thought of it as odd but didn’t hesitate to get away from the flame and walk to Vivi’s house. By that time it was mid afternoon, not that those at home are really worried but hey details man. The sun was now being blocked out by clouds as the temperature dropped a bit,I didn’t mind.
I had just knocked on Vivi’s door when I heard it, I still can't quite properly describe the sound, you know when you slam a door there's a bit of a gust of wind from it and then a loud !BANG!? Sorta like that. I looked up as the wind pushed my chocolate brown hair in my face, I pushed it up looking again into the sky where I thought the sound had come from and I was so scared I fell to my ass in horror. The sun wasn’t being blocked by clouds like I had originally thought, it was being covered by something else entirely. Spaceship, no, Destroyers. I quickly came back to my senses and scuffled back to the door. “Vivi?, c’mon! You gotta let me in there! Please? Are you th-*” I was pulled inside by Vivi’s mother, Becka. I think her name was, she put a finger to her mouth and ushered me inside. I guess their family knew what was going on. Vivi was in the center of the kitchen looking scared but when she saw me she took my hand and rushed me to the window and ducked down beside it. I’d like to say that the rest didn’t happen,I was living a bad dream and I’d wake up any minute now. I tried pinching myself and cursed under my breath, definitely real Ember. A few silent moments passed and I thought to myself that maybe nothing would happen and it was… a happy accident? I'm not sure. But it wasn’t an accident, not one destroyer battleship but four touched down on the village. They ravaged the town and killed all in sight, I'm sparing the details because trust me blood and burning buildings are not something you want to hear about. Vivi’s parents tried to go out and do something, we watched them from the comfort of our alcove in her house as they got murdered in front of our eyes, they were good people who died for something we didn’t know then. The people who ransacked and destroyed our town were nothing but tyrants, they wore what looked like white spandex suits that went along their whole bodies excluding their faces where they wore an obsidian black helmet. The only thing that stood out on them were their stars for their ranks and the weapons they wielded, oh, and if they had any blood painted across their uniforms. We started to cry simultaneously, we knew that they’d start searching the houses next and we’d be done for. We tried to hide but it was no use, they found us anyway. As we were ripped from our hiding spots in the basement we were able to see the whole destruction before our eyes, it was like nothing you could ever imagine, buildings lay half burned with bricks and stones torn from the building as though they were looking for something. Markets burned along with the people who were in them. The rotting smell of human flesh was in the air and it made my nose sting. But all of this didn’t seem to be stopping them from finding what I was thinking they were trying to find.
Vivi and I were lined up with a lot of other people in a row and had our hands and legs fastened together. “READY!” said a mans voice from under the uniform and helmet, Oh fucking hell here we go I thought, publicly executed and im not even thirteen fuck,fuck,fuck and what about my family? Are they in a field somewhere burning? “AIM!” I looked at Vivi and tried to smile, at least she’d see hope or happiness from someone before we died. “Wait lieutenant” A woman’s voice!. I didn’t dare look in fear or being shot but I could tell she was coming our way. “I personally want to give the order for this one, we’ve killed the rest and i’ve barely had any fun you know” she said it in almost a teasing seductive way to the lieutenant who probably didn’t dare say no to this woman. “Of course Captain, do as you wish.” Captain? Who is this Captain?I almost wanted to look around again. “Ha ha ha, why thank you, well what are you waiting for? FIRE!”
The horrible sound of a gunshot, ears ringing as they whirl past you and hit the people you know and love, I clamped my eyes shut as hard as possible and knew that it would be all over soon.
But I was alive, my left ear was stinging/ringing but I was still very much alive. I dared to open my eyes and saw in my peripheral vision that Vivi was lying in the broken ground, though compared to every other dead person I’d seen she didn’t look at it. Footsteps came my way. Oh crap are they gonna torture me? Try to find out where that thing that I don’t even know what it is? Beat me until im black and blue like my father has? The footsteps stopped beside me. A beautiful woman bent down and grabbed my face. She had five stars on her and a lot of blood, her helmet was removed or she didn’t have one so I could see her blue eyes and chocolate brown hair like mine I thought. “You are fairly lucky to have survived this ordeal you know, do you know who I am and what I am?” I didn’t dare speak so I simply just shook my head. “I'm part of a team who are trying to find something very powerful, an artifact you might say, and I was to believe you had it but I can see how wrong I was darling” she laughed “but my goodness how fun that was!” she threw me down into the mud and notioned for her subordinates to follow her, she was obviously the captain. Face down in the mud I tried to squirm free and do anything I could to get free, No! I thought, my life can’t end like this, not with some pretty white girl coming into my world and taking everything right from under my legs!. “You will be stopped” I spurted out. She stopped and turned on her heels “Oh? And you think you will stop me? Ha! You are foolish” she smiled at me “Would it not be easier to kill her Syd–* I mean Captain?” said the lieutenant. She looked at me like a dog pondering a new bone. “No, there is a reason I am keeping her alive, she may just be what this universe needs you know” she said winking.
Suddenly a white light appeared on her palms as she lifted them up and they danced beautifully around her body “Remember this day Ember Forwiz, you may not want to but you will remember this, you are destined for great power, do not say I didn’t warn you.” She smiled and snapped her finger, the white light stopped, the ringing dispersed and the world went oh so very dark.