Celestial Wraith
JP with Jaxx, Redsword, Trustno1 and Cindy
"The only way to finish this is if we move further into the basement. Everyone make sure your weaponry is loaded. I have a feeling they're going to be more monsters down down there. These are some of the toughest we've ever faced. Elias has something planned for us. If we can stop him, we can make it out of here." Said Sartre. He looked at Alyssa and reached to take her hand. Janice and Robert were still following the team. They had their pistols at the ready but they were extremely frightened. Janice being a member of the Phoenician pirate faction was a little bit less upset but she was still shaken.
Sung watched as everything happened. He was unsure what to make of it, as he had never taken on this type of power. He had taken on a lot in his time, but not like what was going on now. There was little he could do for Alyssa. She was on her own to work through everything she had just experienced. He would have to watch her carefully and hope she held it together. All he could do was support the team, and fate seemed to have other plans for him.
Sartre gripped Alyssa's hand with strength. He looked her in the eyes, he knew her. He noticed something was different........... he took a moment. "In the chip: tell me what's going on Alyssa.”
"Not right now," Alyssa replied into the chip but she kept her hand in his. It wasn't said with any sort of rebuff but just it was too much to get into right now. "We can talk later.”
Peter said into the chip: You seem different. we'll talk later.”
Agent Powers gave the group a smolder and kept his thoughts to himself. He looked at Ekaterina who was also keeping her thoughts to herself. It was clear there was a lot more going on with Sartre and Alyssa even though they did say much. Since Alyssa was still alive and not wounded physically, Agent Powers felt he did his job. However he had a feeling she was having trouble dealing with field work, especially at this level of chaos. Sadly there was not a lot he could do for her trauma. Then he remembered and reached into his pocket and pulled out a hard chocolate Tootsie Roll lollipop and handed it to Alyssa as he said, "Sometimes a bit of chocolate takes the edge off.”
Alyssa Wilson’s trembling fingers hovered over the silver pendant suspended from the creature’s twisted neck. The Talisman of the Catman seemed almost out of place amidst the gore and savagery of the Beast-Clad Juggernaut, as though it belonged to another realm entirely. Its feline face was sleek and elegant, the emerald eyes glowing faintly in the dim light, casting an eerie green glow across her pale face. She hesitated before touching it, the faint vibrations in the air around the talisman whispering promises both soothing and sinister.
When her fingertips brushed the surface of the pendant, a soft purr emanated from within—a sound that seemed to reverberate through her very bones. It was unnaturally calming, like the lullaby of an ancient beast that had long since learned to feign gentleness. But beneath the soothing vibrations was an undertone, a subsonic rumble that carried unspoken danger, a reminder of the predator that lingered just beneath the surface.
The purring ceased the moment she lifted the talisman from the creature’s ruined neck. Alyssa shuddered as the warmth it exuded spread through her hand, calming her hammering heart even as the whispered danger lingered in her thoughts. She slipped the pendant into her pocket, its faint warmth still resonating against her leg, and turned to Sartre, who was watching her with a mixture of concern and unease.
Without a word, he reached for her hand. His grip was firm, grounding her as they moved deeper into the labyrinthine basement. "I've never held hands with someone during a mission before." said Sartre. The flickering light cast jagged shadows on the walls, turning the grotesque murals that adorned them into shifting nightmares. Images of writhing bodies, their limbs intertwined in a grotesque parody of unity, stretched across the stone. Faces twisted in agony emerged from the grime, their hollow eyes following Alyssa and Sartre as they passed.
The air grew colder with each step, and the faint hum of the talisman seemed to grow louder in Alyssa’s pocket, as if responding to the oppressive darkness around them. The narrow stairway descended further into the abyss, the walls slick with an oily substance that glistened like liquid shadow. The scent of decay grew stronger, mingling with something sharper, more acrid—a stench that clawed at their throats.
Around a bend, they came upon a tableau of horror. Piles of bones, gnawed and shattered, were heaped in corners like discarded offerings. The walls bore fresh marks—claw gouges that carved symbols into the stone. They were incomprehensible, yet their jagged shapes tugged at something primal in Alyssa’s mind, filling her with a creeping dread that made her grip Sartre’s hand tighter.
Then, the hum in the air shifted. It grew deeper, vibrating through the stone itself, a resonance that set their teeth on edge. Ahead of them, the passage opened into a vast chamber, its ceiling vanishing into darkness. And there, at its center, floated the Celestial Wraith.
It was a being of impossible beauty and terror, a silhouette of stardust and nebulae shifting and shimmering with every subtle movement. Its head, crowned with jagged silver spines, seemed to drink in the faint light, the crescent shape giving it an otherworldly majesty. The almond-shaped eyes burned coldly, their piercing gaze locking onto Alyssa and Sartre as if stripping their very souls bare.
The creature’s elongated limbs moved with an eerie grace, the talons at their ends crackling with blue energy that hummed with a power beyond comprehension. Its lower half dissolved into swirling cosmic mist, faint trails of starlight dissipating in its wake as it hovered silently before them.
The hum became a symphony, a deep, reIt spoke.
Its voice was a sound of void and infinity, a reverberation that seemed to echo not just in the chamber but in the very fabric of reality. Words formed in the space between thought and sound, incomprehensible yet laden with meaning that bypassed comprehension and drove straight into the soul. Alyssa felt it more than heard it, a whisper of a thousand collapsing galaxies and the promise of truths no mortal should ever know.
The Wraith raised one shimmering hand, its talons extending impossibly long, each point seeming to distort the air around it. Sartre stepped forward, his free hand tightening around his pistol, but Alyssa held him back. The talisman in her pocket pulsed with warmth, its vibrations matching the rhythm of the Wraith’s hum.
The monster’s afterimages blurred as it moved, a flicker of light and shadow that made it impossible to follow. It loomed closer, its glowing eyes locking onto Alyssa’s. She couldn’t look away, couldn’t move, as the Wraith’s presence filled her mind with visions—cosmic vistas of spiraling galaxies, the infinite void, and an unrelenting sense of insignificance.
At that moment, Alyssa understood. This was not merely a monster. It was a fragment of something far greater, a shard of an unknowable entity that had existed before time itself. And it was here to judge.sonant vibration that filled the chamber. Alyssa’s chest tightened, her breath catching as the sound grew louder, its pitch shifting in a way that felt like the collapse of distant stars. The Wraith tilted its head, a slow, deliberate motion that sent ripples through the nebulae comprising its form.
Alyssa stood starring at the wrath. While her mind was still plagued with images which turned her stomach and, in a sense, broke a part of her soul. The hacker spoke to the wrath, completely uncertain of its ability to hear or understand her. "We are here to help. To stop the end of the world. You can help us - you can attempt to kill us but we aren't stopping our mission." The hacker didn't consider herself brave but, in those fleeting moment, it was there.
She had taken the lollipop and thanked Max but right now it stayed in her pocket.
Sung looked like he was about to cut loose. His sword shined brightly. The runes lit up independently, and the sword's edges blazed with a gold-light mist. The glow reflected his face. His expression was one of focus. His body was ready to strike. He could feel The Wraith there. His training as a master came to the front. He exhaled slowly. Gripping his sword. He stepped next to Alyssa. "Tell us what you see, Alyssa. We are here; you are not alone," said Sung, confident and soothing. He projected calm and strength, the experience of a master. He was not sure how the Wraith played into all of this. But he did make it quite clear in body language to the Wraith that if it got closer, Sung would respond.
Alyssa heard Sung's words. "I saw, basically, the end of the world. It is very unsettling. But he, it," pointing to the wrath. "Is a part of something great. Something ancient that I can't put my finger on. It showed me the great cosmos." She pulled out the silver pendant. "This reacts to its presence. Not in a terrifying way but something warm, calming in a sense, yet primal. A hum of sorts." She gestured back towards the wrath. "It is here to judge us - what we do. Prue...Prue said to not be afraid - that they weren't demons. I had made the connection with the band Kiss but I somehow doubt we're going to run into a famous rock band in these depths. Maybe, Kiss is just the token of these beings - maybe we're not supposed to be afraid of it." Once again indicating she meant the wrath that stood before her.
"We are not the elders." it said "be prepared to fight the other two." The Wraith handed Alyssa Talisman of the Spaceman a glowing, opalescent orb that seems to contain an entire galaxy. Touching the orb induces a sensation of weightlessness and fills the holder’s mind with visions of infinite space, alien worlds, and forgotten cosmic wonders. The talisman allows the wielder to temporarily defy gravity, their movements becoming fluid and unbound, as if they, too, are part of the great expanse. Whispers of ancient stellar secrets accompany the visions, but delving too deeply risks being consumed by the endless void.
The wraith disappeared into smoke.