One Year Anniversary!


The dining hall was packed as numerous people from the fanfics of Beacon of Light Amidst Darkness were all seated at their respective tables. The principal canon characters were all placed near the front followed by the originals and then by anyone else that wasn't important enough to be mentioned in the previous two areas. All were dressed in their finest attire as mandated by the strict dress code, watching the stage before them expectantly.

"Why are we even here?" Zel muttered looking bored.

"Because Theria-san would do something so horrible it could not be put into print else Big Brother would come down and purged this entire area," Amelia explained as Zel rolled his eye.

"Doesn't she always say that?" Zel muttered as he took out a cigarette and lit it. Smoking it for a bit, he paused, "Since when did I ever smoke?"

"I think the author is trying something new," Gourry said, fiddling with his napkin. "I wonder who's doing it this time?"

"Well there is always one way to find out," Lina smiled, pushing up the sleeve of her dress as she picked up a knife on the table.

"What are you going to do Lina-san?" Amelia asked as Lina scanned the ceiling.

Lina looked carefully before she spotted something and threw the knife there. Everyone looked at where the gleam of the light was last before a body came falling down from the ceiling and crashed onto the stage. Everyone stared at the body in shock, and for some in confusion since they had no idea who it was, before turning back to Lina, who was smiling smugly.

"It's SephZero," Xelloss remarked, using his staff to probe the corpse with a knife in its back. "He really gets killed a lot, no?"

"Well if he is dead then how can he still be writing this?" Gourry asked as everyone paused for a moment, mulling over Gourry's comment.

"I don't know," Zel grumbled leaning on his elbow.

All conversation stopped as the lights all them dimmed and the spotlights flashed to the stage. The curtains drew back to reveal a giant screen with staircases curling around it from behind. Drumrolls set the beat for several stage crewmembers who ran in to remove the body from the stage before leaving.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, along with any other assorted lifeforms that happen to be in the audience," spoke that disembodied announcer voice that no one could be sure from where it came. "Welcome to the Slayers Beacon of Light Amidst Darkness 1st anniversary special commemorating one year of fanfics and barely any fanart of Slayers," the voice rasped before it made the sound of someone passing out onto the floor.

"He should try to breath more," Amelia commented as everyone hushed her.

Music piped through the speakers as the assistants to the hypnotist in Slayer the Movie came running down the staircases onto the stage. They were all dressed in flamingo showgirl costume sthat did nothing to hide their hideously hairy legs. As the audience watched in transfixed horror, they started to dance to the music of "Shake your groove thing." Please don't even try to think about how this would look like, please don't for your own sanity's sake.

"Now that is disturbing," Dynast muttered. "Hairy legged guys in drag dancing. Truly disturbing."

"Well, I heard they had some sort of budget problem with this whole production so they needed to cut some corners on things," Dolphin sighed as she tried to avoid looking at the dancing men.

As soon as it was over, the crowd got up with a standing ovation to the performance. All of them were glad that it was finally over, though not before a few of them had blinded themselves in order to stop the horrid performance.

A podium rose up in the front of the stage for a figure appearing in a wisp of smoke. From neck down he was dressed in black. He stared at them all with his evil looking eyes, more than a few audience members wondering who he was.

"And now the *cough* host of the show, Morpheus. Also the self proclaimed Lord of Dreams, the nigh Eternal Sleeper, and a bunch of other evil titles."

"Must be some newbie the Author made for the fic," Lina grumbled as Morpheus stared sternly at her.

Lina returned with his gaze by giving him the salute.

Ignoring her gesture, Morpheus addressed the audience. "Greetings all of you, who against your will have been dragged to come to this. I, myself, was peacefully sleeping my nigh eternal slumber, before I was so rudely awaken to host this. So if I have to suffer, so will the rest of you."

"That's harsh," Gourry commented.

"This event marks the fist anniversary of the site that has been known as Beacon of Light Amidst Darkness (it is such a pretentious title) that has been issuing out one year of fanfics on Slayers to the people that reside on the net. All this couldn't be possible without the help of its esteemed creator and current maintainer Theria. And to a lesser extent, her brother SephZero who helps on occasion. So let's look back to the early days of the creation of this site," Morpheus gestured as the screen behind him lit up.

"Let's not!" someone in the audience screamed before a jet of greenish fire consumed him in a raging burst of flames.

All eyes followed the trail back to Morpheus, who asked, "Anyone else care to make a suggestion?" Everyone wisely decided to stay silent, so Morpheus said, "Very well then, we will continued."

"On April 19, 1999, the site that would be henceforth known as the Beacon of Light Amidst Darkness made its debut on the simplenet account of Theria. This collaboration was not the dream seed of its two creaters, but more or less a place to hold the Slayer fanfics that had been building up in their minds. Both Theria and SephZero were not strangers to the world of fanfic. Theria had spent a great deal of time earlier in her works of Yoroiden Samurai Troopers (Not Ronin Warriors!) and Final Fantasy 7. SephZero had work on numerous Squaresoft games fics and even a bit of Tenchi Muyo. Both were insanely dedicated to the creation of this new site."

The screen changed color as it displayed the visage of Theria who did not seem to notice that the camera was pointed at her. Instead, she seemed to be yelling at someone off screen.

""Talk?! No one said anything about talking! I don't want to talk in front of people! Where's the exit!!" Theria screamed as she started to run off.

Her footstep could be heard fading away, before sounds of shouting and even more sounds of running could be heard. Screams of fear and loud crashing of backstage props surrounded the pursuers as they attempted to tackle her down. There were sounds of roping someone up and gagging them before Theria was dragged before the camera and deposited in front of it.

After being ungagged, Theria looked at the camera and screamed, "AAAAAAHHHH!!! There are people out there!!!"

"I wonder what makes her say that when she's talking to a camera?" Xelloss muttered as the image of Theria glared at him.

"And you shut up!!"

Morpheus blinked at what happened and muttered, "Technically, that shouldn't be possible."

Theria stuck out her tongue.

"Let's just get this over with and get on with the show," Morpheu sighed.

"...okay," Theira said taking a deep breath.

Morpheus added, "Slow enough so everyone can understand you."

Theria managed to untie an arm in order to pull down an eyelid while sticking out her tongue.

"She certainly is childish," Zel grumbled at the display.

"And she's the one writing us most of the time too..." Amelia mumbled as Theria finally decided to speak.

"Um, okay, as the founder and overall maintainer and cough main and usually only cough fanfic writer for the site because someone else tends to be too lazy to write anything because he's dead again... sigh Anyway, I guess I'm supposed to talk about Slayers: Beacon of Light Amidst Darkness, hereon referred to as Slayers Beacon because I know my brother is going to butcher the spelling (which he already did and I had to correct), and its founding."

"Well, let's just say long ago I thought reasonable Slayers fanfics didn't exist (that was around the time Software Sculpture just brought out the series) so I gave up on the idea. Of course, even then, I always felt Lina and Zel would go great together."

"Well this is getting rather opinionated," Zel muttered.

Lina wasn't listening as she was devouring the bucket of fried chicken she had smuggled into the show.

"And before anyone starts arguing for their personal preference, I've stuck to Lina/Zel even through Next and Try. The latter I saw about a month after it came out in Japan and I've had the last LD for Next for about that long (so yes I knew about that infamous ending). But everyone already knows what my bias is right?"

A someone in the sound booth turned on the long suffering moans. "Ahem, anyway (I say that a lot don't I?), after finishing TRY, my brother and I did discuss some story ideas but never wrote them. So what got me started on writing Slayers fanfiction? Darkness Rising. (My dear brother pointed it out to me in his prodigious amount of free time to surf the Net.) And all of these nice stories (that were thankfully nothing like the ones that scared me away initially) and of course Lina/Zel stories. ^_- So yes, go pay your worship to Steph. Now."

Fibrizo staring sullenly at a cup of milk, "Are you sure she isn't getting paid for that kind of blatant plug?"

A hand holding a wad of money appeared next Theria which she gravely took and hid from view, all the while looking the other way.

"So I hopped onto the Slayers Fanatics list, read through the entire archive up to that point (in one day), bugged Steph about Slayers Elseworld, and five days later sent my first Slayers fanfic, Slayers HS. Who would have guessed that a day like today would come? And that very weekend (for some reason I was staying up in Berkeley that time...) I made my Slayers section on my simplenet site. And in a fit of inspiration/insanity, named it 'Slayers: Beacon of Light Amidst Darkness'."

Reilin grumbled from his table, "Insanity is right."

"Actually, it has a religious texture to it. Salvation in the deepest depths of despair," Quar responded holding up a text, before Relin whacked him with it.

"Those were the good old days, when not a few days would go by without my posting a new part or new story to the page and the mailing list. By the way, during those good old days, I averaged about 14 story parts a month. That included months when I still had Slayers AD and Rewrite to contend with."

"Speaking of which, whatever did happen to that sequel to Next Chance?" Gaav questioned before Theria leaned out of the screen to whack Gaav with an iron fan.

"Now this is getting freaky..." Dynast muttered looking at the smashed Chaos Dragon.

"Pardon the interruption, where was I?" Theria remarked returning to the screen.

Leaping up, Lina said, "You were going to dismiss us and give me power over all living things in existence."

Theria rolled her eyes and snorted. "I think not."

"Damn," Lina muttered snapping her fingers.

"Anyway, I'm very happy that my and my brother's stories have been so well-received and liked. (Otherwise we'd descend into a spiral of despair.) We've crossed the 41,000 mark by the time this story comes up and I hope that we'll continue to receive everyone's support."

"I thought she didn't like to talk?" Gourry inquired. Zel shrugged.

"How much longer can this go on?" Amelia whined. "She certainly seems as long-winded as Lina-san."

"Hey!" Lina yelled.

"Perhaps it's a reflection of her writing? How many times has she needed to split a chapter because she went overboard with character interaction?" Xelloss suggested.

"Not that there is much to describe for certain Namagomis," Filia hissed.

"...HEY I'M TALKING HERE!!" Theria screamed as a huge demon version of her head spitting out fire stuck out of the screen.

"..."

"Sheesh. Um, anyway...I guess that's it...Morpheus, your cue?" Theria sighed returning to normal.

Morpheus was sleeping at the podium.

Collective sweatdrops.

"Wow, he can sleep while standing up," Gourry exclaimed.

"Yes, I can," Morpheus remarked opening his eyes as the screen behind went blank. "We'll now have a little commentary by Lei Magnus, otherwise know as Demon King of the North. He'll be speaking on behalf of SephZero since the author was so rudely slain earlier."

All eyes turned on Lina as she looked away whistling innocently.

Morpheus stepped away from the podium as a huge slab of ice holding the Demon King of the North was brought across the stage. Placing it in front of the podium, the stagehands quickly scattered as the chunk of ice stood there. A sagebrush blew by as long minutes passed by without a word coming from the chunk of ice.

Finally the silence was broken as a sign saying 'Clap' appeared and everyone did just that. Morpheus took the podium back as the hunk of ice was dragged backstage.

"Now wasn't that a rousing speech?" Morpheus inquired as the sounds of cricket could be heard. "I thought we had those infernal creatures killed off before this event?" he muttered to the cue director offstage, who shrugged.

"Get on with the bloody show!" another figure in the audience yelled before meeting a fiery demise.

"Very well then," Morpheus remarked putting his hand down. "Originally during this time we would have had a rousing dance number featuring all the prominent canon male cast of the slayer series doing a striptease."

Whistling could be heard in the audience.

"But the safety inspector said that we couldn't do it since this place is not allow to hold the number of fangirls that would come if that should happen."

Moans could be heard.

"But we are selling a limited edition video tape of the rehearsal of the number that they were going to be doing after the show. It's a fifty-minute tape going for $19.99. Supplies are limited."

"I can't believe he's trying to sell that..." Zel muttered.

"I wonder where the booth is?" Lina remarked. Zel glared at her.

"So we'll be moving on to our award ceremony," Morpheus remarked pulling out a sizable stack of envelopes from beneath the podium. "The author would like to thank all the readers' support and commentary. Which was frankly none since the author forgot to get them. So he handpicked them all himself."

"Well that's no surprise," Dolphin said tapping her fingers on the table.

"Our first category is creature that shouldn't reappear in our fic," Morpheus said as he opened up the envelope and the screen light up again. "The slug that was Lina's bed in Rest and Relaxation."

Excerpt from Rest and Relaxation Part 3

There was only the faint moonlight to illuminate her room but Lina didn't bother lighting a candle. She knew where everything was and she was going straight to sleep anyway. Tossing her cape and sword aside, she sat on the bed and pulled off her boots. The bed felt rather soft. The Innkeeper must have changed mattresses recently. Lina dropped into bed and rolled onto her side.

That's strange. The bed feels smooth but it isn't silk...

And she noticed that the mattress seemed to be lower on the sides of the bed than in the middle.

"Lighting," Lina cast frowning.

Right in front of her face were two eyes. The two eyes blinked. Lina blinked. She followed the eyes down the tentacles they were sitting on down into the yellowish mass connected to it. She was lying on the biggest slug she had ever seen. As she realized this, Lina began to notice the hundreds of other slugs of various sizes all over her room.

"IYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!" The scream of utter terror rocked the inn.

Back in the lobby where everyone else was collected, they shook their heads knowingly.

End Excerpt

"Boy were you freaked out in that scene," Gourry commented as Lina whacked him over the head.

Ignoring the antics in the audience, Morpheus continued, "The most stupidest dialogue to grace the fics is... The Orihalcom Golem's final speech!"

Excerpt from Slayers HS Part 3

Her aim was perfect as it hit the princess of Zoana smack in the forehead, knocking her out instantly. The sceptre bounced off and rolled down the front of the golem.

"Oh! Oh! I have been struck a mortal blow!" said a hollow metallic voice. Lina, Zel, and the boy watched dumbly as the golem put a hand to its chest, staggering as if it was suffering from mortal blow.

"...I thought...it was only controlled by Martina..." Lina muttered.

"It seems...that there is an elemental spirit in there after all," Zel added.

"How can it talk?" the boy asked. Lina and Zel shrugged.

"Oh! Oh! Is this the end of the great Orihalcon Golem? Shall the ballads end with this ignomious defeat?" the golem lamented.

"That's the worst acting I've ever seen," Lina groaned. Zel and the boy simply nodded their agreement.

"Ah! I breathe my last," the golem gasped as it collapsed on to the Eastern division of Slayers High School.

End Excerpt

"That was pretty stupid," Dynast muttered before he looked to his right that was currently vacant. "Where's Zelas?" he asked as Gaav and Fibrizo shrugged.

"She snoring underneath the table from all the contraband liquor she smuggled in," Dolphin said.

"Oh, I thought the nail grating noise was in my head," Dynast sighed as Gaav and Fibirzo nodded.

"Men," Dolphin groaned.

"Least likely to ever be finished by the next anniversary special is Slayer HS!"

"Well that was expected," Zel groaned.

"I heard she was going to stretch it all the way to college," Amelia added.

"Award going to the most OOC appearance of a Slayers canon (more or less) goes to the Lord of Nightmare in the parody ending of Slayers Next."

Excerpt from But Something Was Different

LoN inquired, "Can I ask of you something Grandson?"

"What?" Zel asked hesitant of what might be coming.

Holding up a beautiful pink dress, LoN smiled, "Can you wear this dress for your dear grandmother? I think you would look cute in it."

Zel's jaw unhinged, the Mazoku Lords hit the ground, and Xelloss burst out laughing. Terim merely shook his head at the whole incident.

"My god, she's whacked," Dynast muttered.

End Excerpt

"That was an understatement," Zelgadiss grumbled turning a bit red.

"You're lucky they didn't stick in the part when she forced you to wear it," Lina snickered as Zel turned even redder.

"Going on," Morpheus cleared his throat as he looked through the next envelope. "Award for most outstanding performance as a collective organization goes to the Men's Club."

Excerpt from How Terim Met Zelas Part 2

SaiChuRo went into a depression, mumbling about Ancient Dragons.

"You know," Ashford pondered. "Didn't the great one..." Everyone turned and bowed to the picture of Lei Magnus that took up an entire wall of the clubhouse. "...didn't he say that this clubhouse will fall should ever a woman step into its confines?"

All around them the building crumbled to pieces.

Goldias sighed. "And so the prophecy comes true."

"Let's move to the other one he built down the street," Terim suggested.

End Excerpt

Noticing that most of the audience had fallen asleep, Morpheus sighed, "And now we'll be closing this event with previews of what possibly might be coming up for the next year."

"Yeah, previews!" someone in the crowd roared.

TEASER
Untitled
By Theria

"Intruder Alert! Intruder Alert! Sector B5-XA91 has been breached. Anti-intrusion protocol has been initiated. Repeat..." the metallic voice intoned coldly through the gray halls filled with the brisk, running steps of the slightly less inorganic lifeforms making their way to their designated emergency stations.

No one was hesitant or unclear of their destination but compared to one person, a figure of black whose steps were measured and unhurried, they seemed all like lost lambs. Normally, you would expect some kind of resistance to a person going against the flow of a mob but she passed through with nary a bump or a scratch.

The hallway began to clear as everyone reached where they were supposed to be, the dull gray walls reflecting the harsh red lights of the computerized alert that still repeated its message. Behind her dark sunglasses, she spared it an exasperated and contemptuous glance. But it could only be as intelligent as the creatures that programmed it, which was to say, that neither it nor its creators ranked high on her intelligence scale.

Blocking her path was the blockhead cutting off Sector B5-XA91 from this particular corridor. No doubt all other passages, be they corridors like this one or simply air ventilation shafts, were similarly blocked off. Each sector, despite the rather cryptic naming system, was actually quite large and the blockheads were located at positions suitably far enough to prevent any escapee from leaving the sector before the walls came down.

Of course, that also locked inside anyone unfortunate enough to not escape quickly enough but it was a small drawback. The blockheads were a good six feet thick, composite build of course, it was impractical to create a six feet thick slab of metal. In addition, the varied composition also delayed any attempts to force one's way through since the materials were chosen both for the hardness but also for their varied endurance to typical means of extrication.

She placed her hand before the wall, letting her fingers rest on the smooth surface but not her entire palm. The limited contact sufficed. With no sound or signal, the blockhead withdrew, up, down, left, right, diagonal. She stepped through the opening and continued, not bothering to wait for the blockhead to reinstate itself. If her estimations were correct, they were a needless precaution.

Unerringly, she traveled down the dark corridor, noting where various lifeforms were, registering that they were supposed to be there, and then dismissed them. Some of them tried to hail her, those who didn't immediately recognize who she was in the darkness. She ignored them, proceeding past the site where the alarm first initiated to the true source of the intrusion.

It was several twists and turns later when she came upon the 'scene of the crime' as it was so quaintly called about a century or so back. There were no signs of forced entry. But that did not fool her. The security pad next to the door flashed green without neither key nor code, a slight rush of air the only indication that the door had slid open.

A brief scan confirmed her expectations. The intruder had come and gone, with a notable lack of destruction to the premises. Possible culprits reduced to ten. And as much as she didn't like to do it, the present conditions would need to be corrected in order to soothe the organics.

"Emergency alert terminate," she said harshly, transmitting the required security clearance to do so through her nanocomputer. Immediately, the droning voice and its light ceased. Less than a microsecond later, forever in her opinion, the normal lights returned. She stood silently at the door of the lab, waiting for the organic within to get over its emotional release.

"...thank gods someone came," shivered a young organic that her files revealed to be a certain Maverik Allshire, a geneticist prodigy with a serious lecherous bent. "My beautiful little girl...gone! That filthy thing had his hands on my prize creation."

"Then you saw the perpetrator Professor Allshire?"

Allshire pushed up his black-rimmed glasses, arrogant eyes raking over the fine figure before him. Dressed in a black full body suit that practically clung to her every curve, just the way he liked it mind you if clothes needed to be worn, and an equally form-fitting red jacket, this 'girl' was currently the top operative of the leader of this organization. As he painfully drew his eyes back up her body to her face, he took in the perfect skin and smooth red hair that tumbled down her back.

Licking his lips, not out of nervousness, he met her eyes. Or rather, her dark visor that hid her eyes. But he knew already what they looked like. Yes, he knew them quite well.

"It was quite amazing really. Something that Sector QW-24P0 has been trying to do with technology for all of these years but always failed to do so. One minute I was tweaking, er I mean monitoring my little creation and the next, with none of the fancy magician tricks you see in the retro films, there he was. Just smiled at me, held up his finger as if to say keep quiet, and then went about stealing my little girl."

"And you did nothing to resist him?" she asked coolly. If Allshire wasn't on a hormone drive, something she had registered the moment he started looking at her, his knees would have turned to jelly at her tone. Facing her displeasure was equivalent to facing their leader's.

"Hey, I'm just a lowly drudge worker. What am I to do when something just waltzes its way in, and not through the door mind you, past hundreds of layers of security? Heck, I should be mad at you for having such a lousy security net." He rubbed his sweaty hands together.

"This 'lousy security net' successfully repulsed over a thousand simulations and over a dozen real attacks. However, as I noted to my master before, none of the scenarios took into account it." Her eyes turned to study again the opened and drained glass polymer-reinforced column whose occupant was now missing. "And the suspect?"

"About the same height as me, dark hair cut straight at the shoulders and across his brow, I could almost have sworn it was rather purplish but that wouldn't be a natural shade, the most bland smile I've ever seen on anyone's face. Let's see, he was wearing..."

"Enough." Possible suspects reduced to one. Expectations have been met. The master will not be pleased with this. "If she was taken, then this was only a diversion from his other target."

"Other target?" He faked innocence but he was already pretty sure what the other target the intruder went after. It wouldn't have made sense to take only one, unless of course the kidnapper was an idiot which Allshire sincerely doubted.

She didn't answer for several moments but when she did, what she said was not what he was expecting. "Professor Maverik Allshire, R. Eye will see you immediately to discuss the unauthorized 'tweaking' you did on the subject."

Allshire scratched his head as he shrugged in resignation. R. Eye, the master of this organization, was going to burn his ears back. But Allshire had no fears about his future, he was too good with genetics for them to get rid of him. No matter how good of a geneticist you were, no matter how far science had advanced, you simply couldn't create a clone with the exact same memories as the original. They needed him intact and in working condition.

"Right right, I'm going," he waved carelessly. "I'm surprised you aren't concerned. After all, it looks like there's going to be another you running around. LINA."

LINA removed her dark visor, and only looked at him with her ruby eyes. What went on behind them, only she and probably the computers and R. Eye knew for certain.

PREVIEW
A Fable That Never Ends
6th Night
By Theria

As many years as nights have passed, things change, others remain the same. The king that had ruled Emaar six years ago still ruled now, though King Eldran of Saillune had passed away and left his kingdom in the hands of his son, Philionel el Saillune. Peace reigned with a strong fist but gentle hand across the land.

Still, some did not feel that ease of the heart, pulled by strings unknowingly forged in the past. One such person had gone again, as he had gone every year for the last sixteen years, to a marker of that past. For what reason he continued such a custom, he will not say.

Seasons come, seasons go, but nothing can remain as it is forever. Not hopes, not dreams, not fears, not peace. With peace comes a type of idleness, that as the king of Emaar knew well, would only lead to trouble.

At the country estate of the second prince of Emaar, the servants were well on their way with taking care of the day's work. Despite the absence of the caretaker of their master's estate or perhaps because of it, they were all the more eager to do get about it. There was not one person among them who didn't know where it was the seneschal was during this one night and more than a few thought he should just give up the silliness and just go look for the special lady already.

"Shala! Has anyone seen where Shala is?" called a boy just entering puberty. Unlike other youths of his age, he was not gangly with hands and feet larger than the rest of his body. In fact, he was slim and almost delicate, due to poor health when he was younger, and as several ladies-in-waiting noted, looked a bit more feminine than masculine. The haphazard way his priest robes hung off of his frame didn't help the image. "Ceiphied's eyes, where is she?"

"Her highness is in the courtyard with the swordmaster," one of the manservants informed his young master, bowing in respect even over the load of bedsheets he was carrying.

"Again?" the young master huffed, brushing back some of the yellow strands that in his rush had fallen out despite the long, painstaking process he had undergone each morning to make them stay combed back. At least when they were combed back, he didn't look quite so similar to a girl. "What are her suitors going to think when they see the princess sweating like a pig?"

With a speed not hindered by his voluminous robes, the boy ran downstairs and outside to the courtyard where the ringing of steel echoed. As the servant had said, his older sister was there, garbed in leather training armor, inside the flashes of silver from the two blades she wielded.

"Shala! Shala...I have some important...news..." he said, gasping for breath, not used to too much physical exertion. The continued sounds of metal crossing metal told him that she hadn't heard a word, or at least wasn't intent on stopping. "SHALA!! I just saw a vision!!!"

A blade the swordmaster didn't notice swung in and swept aside his own, followed quickly by a shapely leg that planted itself firmly in his gut. The swordmaster reflected he wasn't getting paid enough for this before he was sent flying back off of his feet. The victor of the duel let out a long breath, rolling her shoulders to ease the knots she could feel forming. Well, she had been practicing since sun up.

"Is that any way for a prince to behave?" Shala asked, giving her younger brother an exasperated look. Several strands of her dark hair clung to her neck and rosy cheeks but most of it was tied back to fall down behind her. "Especially one who is training to be a priest of Ceiphied."

"And I take it that you're behaving like a typical princess?" he retorted, his mouth turned down in a pout reminiscent of his childhood. "At least, I'm dressed respectably."

"You mean like a naughty choir boy. Silk gowns and pearl necklaces are hardly suitable for sword play," Shala shrugged, searching for a clean cloth to wipe down her blades. She may have gained her mother's looks but her skill with blades came all from her father. "So what is it? You came all the way down here, making more noise than if a pack of evil fey were after you, for a reason that had better be important enough to interrupt my sparring session."

"Didn't you hear? I had a vision!"

She raised an eyebrow, her blue eyes finally showing some interest. "Really? Congratulations. I'm sure the head priest isn't regretting his decision to allow you to apprentice."

Few people were able to divine things accurately, fewer still that could actually receive visions. Such people were hoarded carefully, usually by the churches. Their mother, strong as she was in the divine magic, had never received a vision.

"Now if that's all..."

"No! I think this one is important. Remember all of those stories you told me about mother's friend? The one who fought against the Mazoku that destroyed Sairaag?"

"Lina Inverse you mean? What about her?"

"I think I saw her. In my vision."

Shala looked at him, trying to gauge if he was serious or setting up for a big joke. But there was no hidden amusement in his green eyes. Still, he had never seen Lina Inverse before so how could he know? She said as much to him.

"It was her," he insisted stoutly, crossing his arms. "At least, I'm pretty sure it was her. The person I saw did have red hair."

"Vandanes, do you have any idea how many people have red hair?" Shala asked with a sigh. "Are you sure it wasn't just part of some youthful fantasy young boys have when they're beginning to become interested in the opposite gender?"

"Shala! Fine, if you won't believe me, then I'll tell mother about it. She'll know if it was Lina Inverse I saw or not!"

"Vandanes, don't you dare! Mother has never forgiven herself about what happened to Lina and I'm not letting you give her false hope like this."

"Then I'll tell Zelgadiss when he gets back!"

"That might be even...actually, that might be a good idea. Could finally convince him to leave and look for her." Shala contemplated the idea. Zelgadiss was like an uncle, a doting uncle, to the two of them and his loyalty and friendship to their father was almost beyond reproach. Shala used 'almost' because she felt their 'uncle', and seneschal to their prince father, used that friendship as an excuse to not do what he should have done years before. "Good idea. Let's tell Zel the minute he gets back."

"Tell me what the minute I get back?" asked an amused voice. The two royal siblings turned as one to see Zelgadiss, blue-skinned and all, looking at them. He was wearing his old court uniform, the set he only used for one occasion now, and the knees showed the grass stains from kneeling in one place all night. It looked like he had just returned from his vigil.

Shala looked at Vandanes. Vandanes looked back at her. Being the elder, the princess had to take the responsibility of starting. Taking a deep breath, she plunged in.

"Vandanes had a vision about Lina Inverse," she said quickly, and then added, "Or so he thinks."

Her brother scowled at her.

"A vision about...Lina?"

Vandanes squirmed under Zelgadiss's sharp gaze. "Ye-yes sir."

"What did you see?"

"She's alive but..."

"But?"

"I'm not sure but, it looked like someone had captured her."

TEASER
Why
By Theria

...come...

...come to me...

Zelgadiss floated there in the expanse of his dream. It was strange, this dream, nothing like the ones he was accustomed to. The nightmares of despair, self-loathing, anger, those were less frequent now than before but they still came at low points in his life. He couldn't really recall having any nice dreams though and what was happening now could have been classified as one of those except for the uneasiness sitting like a rock in his stomach.

Why do you stay away?

Who was that? Zel couldn't place the voice but it had to be someone he knew if he was hearing it in his dream. Not Amelia, the voice was older than her. There was something lingering in its tone, faded arrogance and something else. Cross off Sylphiel. Filia was older, she was probably old enough to be his grandmother twice over at least, but he could hardly imagine her being seductive. That was another part of that pleading voice. One by one, Zel eliminated the females acquaintance, a task that didn't take much time.

Why don't you come to me?

"I have no idea who you are," Zelgadiss grumbled, not really expecting an answer even if this was his dream. It was his dream right? He hadn't heard of anyone being able to cross over into other people's dreams. That would be quite embarrassing. "At the very least you could try giving me a hint regarding your identity."

I've wanted to see you for so long...

The speaker hadn't heard him. Zel wondered how he could wake himself up and get out of this. Listening to ghostly voices of unknown origin were not part of his idea of a good night's sleep. Especially since tonight, it had taken him a very long time just to fall asleep.

I'm here, always, waiting for you.

Something began to glow before him. Zelgadiss wasn't sure this was a good thing but as it was the only thing that had been happening since he 'woke up' in this dream, he cautiously waited for whatever it was to happen. If it was his dream, he could probably cancel out any negative effects. He hoped.

So long I've waited to touch you.

Part of the glow reached out a tendril, thinning out to form the slender pale, and glowing, arm of such form to indicate a female owner. Not that that was any surprise to him. The level of detail of the arm was amazing, in Zelgadiss's opinion, allowing him to see even the palm lines of the hand that stretched toward him. There were no calluses on the fingers, indicating someone who did not engage in manual labor.

Another tendril/hand had stretched out to him as he studied the first one. Still undecided on how to react to this, his subconscious was making one very weird dream, he didn't flinch as the glowing hands brushed his face. A deathly numbness tingled at the spot where they touched, and it spread as the hands moved down to grasps his shoulders.

Why do you shy from me? My love.

Okay, now this was definitely not in the script. He wanted to protest but his lips refused to move. In fact, not a single part of his body responded to his mental demands, numb and rigid as they were, made by this...this...thing's icy touch.

To be with you...forever.

Zel's mind shifted to hyper-panic mode as the glowing arms, wrapped around his neck pulled him closer to where he guessed the 'face' must be. But he couldn't see it, the face, only the increasing intensity of this...ghost's glow. The cold around his neck sharpened to that of ice shards, cutting across it as if it was normal skin and not golem stone.

Oh gods, he couldn't see the face but he was certain beyond anything else in his life that he was about several millimeters away from being kissed. Wake up NOW!!!

His eyes snapped open into a dark expanse. Panic gripped him as he feared that he was still in that dream but slowly shadows and substance began to separate. Zelgadiss sighed in relief. He was awake, laying on his bedroll in the campsite they had made earlier tonight. Or was that yesterday? He didn't care, as long as he was out of that dream.

"Something wrong?" asked a voice from across the small clearing. Sitting with her back against a tree with her cape wrapped around her was Lina. Did she know he was awake? "And if you try to pass off that you're asleep, I'll throw a rock at you."

"I just had some neck cramps from laying in the wrong position," Zel shrugged, not wanting to tell Lina he just woke up from scary dream. And what he said wasn't entirely untrue, as he noticed now that his neck and shoulders were feeling rather stiff and sore.

He could hear her snort and then the rustle of grass as she got up and carefully made her way over to his bedroll. She had better not be coming over to offer him a massage but it would be like her to try and test him to see if he was telling the truth. Though how she planned to see if he had knotted muscles when his skin was all stone he had no idea.

"You looked pretty comfortable from where I was sitting. Let me take a look."

She was trying to catch him in a lie, he could just tell by the knowing look on her face. No harm in letting her look since he really couldn't find a comfortable sleeping position now. Sitting up, Zel hesitated on exactly how to accomplish the 'let me take a look' order.

"Take off your shirt. The enchanted gem on my dagger should give enough illumination for me to examine your 'neck cramp'," Lina smirked, pulling out said dagger and whispering the words to activate the enchantment.

"Of all people, I never expected you to be the one who wanted me to take off my shirt." Zelgadiss purposely added a suggestive tone to cover his uneasiness at revealing his chimeric body to even a friend. Besides, he wanted to get back at Lina for enjoying this way too much. And from the rising pink on her face, his jab had hit home. Pulling off his shirt, Zel hissed as his shoulders screamed and it felt like he had to rip his shirt away from them.

"Sounds like you got some real bad...cramps..." Lina stared at his left shoulder.

"What?" The chimera asked irritably. If she was setting him up for some joke...

"Let me see your other shoulder," she said steadily even as she moved her light to illuminate his right side. Zel himself couldn't see what she was looking at, not without a mirror at least and her behavior was either annoying him or worrying him. "...cramps you said?"

"Yes, cramps. What about them?"

Lina looked at him and pulled out a hand mirror. Her eyes dared him to make a comment about her carrying something like that on her person but he wisely kept his tongue still. Taking the mirror and letting Lina handle the illumination, Zel took a look at his 'cramps'.

"..."

"Alright Zel, now tell me the truth about how you got your 'cramps'."

Around his neck, and parts of his shoulders near there, was covered with a layer of frost. Some of which had managed to get a foothold inside of his stone skin, splitting it and causing blood to die the otherwise colorless crystals of water red.

End Teaser

"Man those were sure some strange previews," Gourry remarked as the last one was finished. "I wonder how many of those are actually going to be finished by next year?"

"Knowing their track record, probably maybe one," Zel muttered.

"That last one was kind of freaky," Amelia shivered as sounds of snoring could be heard from Morpheus was obviously asleep on the stand again.

"Damnit can't you stay awake for more than a few minutes?" Lina cried as she chucked a fireball at Morpheus.

Snapping awake, he easily blocked the spell as he said, "I can, but such things are hardly of interest to me. Anyway we thank you for coming to this year anniversary of Beacon of Light Amidst Darkness and we - "

Morpheus was interrupted as the screen on the stage exploded sending debris crashing down onto the audience. Stepping out of the smoke was large armored warlord. His armor was lined with spikes along the shoulder pad with a black finish over it. Most shocking was that his face looked like...

"Gourry?" everyone cried.

"Me?" Gourry at the table inquired pointing at himself before Zel whacked him.

"Who the heck are you?" Dynast challenged as the Gourry-lookalike merely laughed.

"Who am I? Why, I am Kas, the Doppelganger of Gourry," Kas announced as he flourished his cape. "And I plan on crashing this pathetic little ceremony of yours."

"You and what army?" Amelia asked.

"This," Kas snapped as a huge horde of villains and monsters emerged from the smoking ruin of the stage behind him.

"You had to ask?" Zel muttered to Amelia.

"Who cares about that," Lina said as she charged up another fireball. "I was getting sick of all this. So let's have a huge fight scene!"

And they did just that. Chairs and people went flying, as the amount of firepower thrown around was enough to level several worlds over. Standing amidst all of the chaos, Morpheus stood silently by the remains of the podium surveying the mess.

"Until next year, goodnight everyone," the announcer coughed before the whole place exploded in a huge flash of light, heralding the end of the first annual tribute to the Beacon of Light Amidst Darkness Anniversary special to commemorate one whole year.


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