Avia VI - Revelations

She walked through the village gates warily, keeping her gaze down and trying her best to not attract attention as she walked past the men and women who passed her or were standing or sitting on the side of the road. The guards at the gate had barely given her a second look, just another hungry looking little waif in a long travel stained cloak trudging by. Then again, wasn’t that all she really was? Sometimes she wondered.

The road was well maintained, but the houses and shops that lined it were a mishmash of old buildings that survived the wars and newer ones cobbled together from the rubble that littered the countryside. For someone who knew history, it looked like a blend of wild west mixed with medieval European villages. To Aria it was just the civilization she knew and lived in.

A man had been following her, keeping his distance but obviously intent on keeping her in his sights. She hadn’t been here in some time and it was unlikely that anyone recognized her. The only conclusion that she could come to was that she didn’t want to know why, she just needed to lose him. Aria quickly ducked into a clothing shop, and hid herself in the middle of a round clothing rack, much like she did as a child. Hunkering down, she fingered the long knife in her belt and waited. He came in slowly, letting his eyes adjust to the dark of the small shop. He craned his neck to look around the room, moving rather clumsily deeper into the shop and past her hiding spot.

Her intent initially had been to simply cut his throat quickly and anonymously in the shop and move on, but his awkwardness gave her pause. Simply killing because she thought he might be a threat was not her way. Changing tactics, she took him down from behind, hitting him low with a thrust of her strong legs. He fell in a heap with Aria on his back and his nose smacking into the hard stones of the floor. Unable to move with her pinning his shoulders under her knees, he moaned into the cold stones. With her knife at his throat she hissed into his ear, “Why are you following me?”

“You broke my nose”, he whined in reply. She could see and smell the steady trickle of blood coming from his mashed nose. Pushing the dagger into his skin, “What do you want?”

“Keesha sent me”, he muttered, before moaning about his nose again.

Aria rolled off of him, a bit embarrassed but still wary. “She got your message, I’ve been waiting for you for days”, he said giving her a petulant look, “Keesha neglected to mention you were so violent, she just said you were a friend.”

Now very embarrassed and blushing, Aria put her knife away and retrieved her backpack. As she picked it up she could see Pixie poking her head up to watch what was happening. “It’s ok Iome, he’s a friend. But stay hidden.” Pixie ducked back down into the bag. Although she felt bad about caging Pixie up, she would draw too much attention if people saw her. Sex Pixies were rare and highly prized.
Turning back to the man, who eyed her suspiciously, she said, “I never sent a message...”

He laughed, his expression finally relaxing, “I’m sure you didn’t intentionally, but she said you were coming, she heard you.”

She could only nod in response, Keesha’s abilities were why she was here. That, and the woman was one of Aria’s few trusted friends. She gave him a cloth to wipe down his nose as he quickly assured the shopkeeper who had shown up at the end of their scuffle that everything was ok. Aria followed him out into the street, and down a maze of back alleys and walkways that passed between, through, and over the buildings of the small village. Finally they arrived in front of a very old multi story tenement made of concrete and brick. Definitely one of the relics from before the war, it stood as one of the tallest buildings, eight or ten stories high.

Sasha, as he had introduced himself during their trek through the town led her into the building, with Pixie poking her head out just a little to look around. He caught sight of her as he looked back to wave Aria into a stairwell. His eyebrows went up, but he said nothing and started up the long climb to the 10th floor. This was a different place than she had last met Keesha, her standing in the community must have grown in the last few years. They came to a plain door at the end of the hall and Sasha knocked. They didn’t wait long before the door was yanked open by a full figured woman whose pretty face was framed by a wild mess of reddish hair. She squealed in delight at the sight of Aria, grabbing her up in a big hug that lifted her feet clear of the ground. Aria grinned and kissed her full on her red painted lips, leaving a good part of the colour on Aria.

Keesha reached back and opened Aria’s pack, and Pixie immediately popped up and flew over to sit on her shoulder and gave her a big kiss on the cheek. They chatted quietly for a moment. Aria took the break to scan the room. It was plainly furnished, as she would expect from Keesha, but what stood out were the number of electronic devices that sat on the shelves and tables. Keesha took Aria by the arm and pulled her to one of the couches arranged around a large table in the living room. Pixie flew up and landed on the table, arranging herself seductively in a fruit bowl that was in the center.

“Aria, you’ve met my friend Sasha, he lives here with me”, Keesha said waving in Sasha’s general direction. “He is the one that got all these devices working, he knows a lot about history too.”

Sasha nodded to Aria, “no hard feelings about the nose, it seems to be fine.” He left for the kitchen, excusing himself to finish preparing dinner.  Turning to face Aria, Keesha’s  expression hardened.

“You have been gone a long time”, she accused, “I thought you were dead by now.”

Aria squirmed uncomfortably under her glare. She was right, of course. It had been... How long had it been. Seasons came and went, Aria was never one to really pay attention to that. But she had no excuse for her friend other than her distaste of the towns and the people that lived in them.

Keesha shushed her apology with a wave, “I don’t need your words, you are here and that is enough for me. And you look great Aria”, she said giving her a very open appraisal, “You look even better than the last time I saw you four years ago.”

“Four years?”, it was a bit of a shock to Aria. “You’re shitting me?”

Keesha gave her an odd look, “You really never have understood time very well, Aria?”

Aria shrugged, one year was much the same as the next. What difference did it make, really? She looked at her friend more closely. Lines were beginning to show around her eyes. She had gained a little weight that Aria felt suited her curvy figure with it’s overripe breasts and round hips. The eyes that looked back at her had changed. Something had changed. But what?

Sasha loudly announced dinner from the kitchen, and soon appeared with plates of steaming food that he deftly placed around the table. “My Sasha was a cook at one time, me makes me fabulous food, as you can see.” she laughed and squeezed her ample bottom to demonstrate. The mood of the room immediately lightened as they dove into the spicy meal of stewed meats and vegetables. Pixie even joined in, sampling from each persons plate before finally declaring that Keesha’s food tasted the best. Quite entranced by the little pixie, Sasha’s eyes followed her as she flitted about.

They talked as they ate, Keesha telling Aria of how her and Sasha had met in a junkyard where they were both searching for relics of value. Aria felt a light pang of jealously as she watched and listened to them, but it quickly passed as Sasha began to talk about his ability to fix the old electric devices. functioning electronics were rare. There was no power, no batteries, and generators were rare. Lights were almost always chemical, as was heat. The Military had electricity, but they didn’t share outside their walled compounds.

Sasha had found small hand cranked generators, about the size of a persons hand, that could keep small devices powered simply by turning a handle at a steady speed. He showed her how he could make a small radio work with it. It crackled to life and just sat there and hummed on the counter. Pixie eyed it dubiously then stuck her nose in the air and flitted off to explore the apartment.

“Not much use without another one to talk to”, Aria pointed out. Sasha smiled and said nothing. Suddenly, from the speaker came a mans voice, “Sector five is clear, moving on to six.” Military!

“Can I have one?”, Aria said eagerly, “It will be very useful to me. I have things I can trade you for?”

“No Aria, you take what you need. I’ve been holding on to this one for you.”, Keesha smiled and handed the radio and crank over to her. Grinning happily Aria stowed it in her bag. “Now Aria, what have you been up to all this time?”

They sat back down and Aria began the story of how she had gone up north and  explored many strange places. She had almost come to grief a number of times and her sense was that it was becoming ever more dangerous out in the world. Skipping over a number of details, she related how she had met up with the lost troop of soldiers. And finally, her encounter with The Mistress. This was why she had come back, she needed to talk to Keesha about what The Mistress had told her. Things too impossible to be true. Sasha nodded his head as he listened. When Aria had finished he looked to Keesha, who nodded for him to go ahead.

“Aria, most of what you have told us I am almost certain is true. In fact, there is even more to the history”, he dragged the word history out as if it carried great weight, “than almost any single person knows. Except me.” He said it without bravado, it was simply a statement of fact, like the sky being blue. “My family have kept this history for generations since before the war when the strangeness began. You see Aria, the war wasn’t the start, or the end of this madness. It started long before that.”

“Back around the year 1980 a young man became very very rich from his company that made what were then called ‘computers’. He used that money to hire the best genetic researchers in the world, and tasked them with creating new types of creatures. At first they did nothing but fail, but over the years they got better. And better. Until finally, around the year 2010 they had created a number of strange mythical creatures and had unlocked many of the secrets of how we are made. He kept all this a secret from the world, and made his plans.”

“You see, his extreme wealth had not gained him the kind of respect and adulation that he thought it would, and should. He craved it, he wanted it, and he would pay anything for it. Being a scientist and a very logical thinker, he was sure that religion was a sham, there was no god. But he realized that a great many people did. His plan was to give the people their god, according to their myths.”

“The first to appear were the leprechauns, little men hiding in the forests. Of course sightings of them drew mountains of attention. Then the pixies started to appear, and all manner of fairy creatures. They all had one message...God was coming for judgement day. The panic began slowly. But it built quickly, the end was coming. Proof was there to be seen. As the madman watched the world begin to topple, he played his ultimate card. “
The Angels came from the skies in their thousands upon thousands, setting on the cities like plagues of locusts. Mankind was cowed, broken, despair ruled. Then he came, from the skies, speaking from a thousand places at once. He decried greed and technology, telling the world that they would either give up their material things, or perish forever. But he made a mistake. The Angels were unstable. They began killing and raping. People organized to protect themselves, and found that they could defeat the angels. The world began to find its feet and stand up.” Sasha’s voice had raised to the point where he was almost shouting, his rage driving his story forward, “and then, he launched his missiles. Millions died. Millions.  millions.” He hung his head and shook it slowly

“John Stanton, as he was once known, had destroyed the world and left it a crumbling ruin. Enhanced by his scientists, he launched into space and has remained there ever since, playing his games with us. almost four hundred years he has been up there, circling the world, toying with us, creating his new abominations and setting them upon us for his own amusement. He actively set his angels and military to the task of destroying all technology and history, so that man would be reduced to primitive life. He is a twisted evil man.”

Aria lay back in her chair, unable to respond to all this information. But, just like the things The Mistress had told her, it all made sense.

“So this isn’t over, this is why things always get worse”, she said shaking her head, “But why doesn’t anyone know?”

“It has been a very very long time Aria, and he has been erasing those memories for all this time.”

Keesha leaned forward, “it is late, let Aria rest and we will talk more tomorrow.”

They said their goodnights and Aria settled into the couch, under the blankets she had been provided. Her head was spinning with all this information. Why hadn’t she known? It made sense, but it seem so...strange. Pixie tucked herself against Aria’s neck, snoring  lightly within seconds of laying down. Aria could not sleep so quickly.

But when sleep came, it brought with it vivid dreams that gave her no peace...

continued in Aria VII