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Memoirs of a RAFian

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Darth Revan:
This is really cool. Keep up the good work.

Cloak:
Thanks, Parker, I shall!  Now, warning! This chapter contains a partial plot dump.  And not that this book takes place BEFORE the recent events in the Intro Randomness RP.

CHAPTER FOUR:
Realm Walker Battle Royal
"Yes, me." the Realm Walker said, sedately walking up to Cloak, stopping ten feet away. "You were expecting some line-dancing vampires?"

Cloak didn't speak.  He was revolted by the newcomer's appearance.  He was a mishmash of hippo, rat, ox, tiger, dragon, horse, ram, dog, boar, rooster, monkey, rabbit, and snake forms.

"You . . . you didn't. . . ." Cloak said, disgust and revulsion in his tone.  "You didn't absorb -- no, you stole the powers of the Twelve! No wonder they weren't as hard to defeat as they should have been."

"The Twelve?" Gaz had detached himself momentarily from battle.  It was then that Cloak noticed that the trolls were no longer fighting back but shrinking to the shadows fearfully, leaving the other RAFians to look around, wondering.

Cloak thought about how he should word his response.

"The Twelve were twelve Realm Walkers --"

"Yeah, I got that part."

"-- ancient Realm Walkers, far older than Malice.  They each had a unique ability -- Karma had yin-yang vision, Speedy had super speed, Imitator could shapeshift, Ghost could turn intangible, and so forth."

Cloak glared daggers at this new Realm Walker.

"And, as it turns out, some time before they went through the veil, this -- this -- this ABOMINATION absorbed their powers.  How I do not know."

"And you shan't know," Abomination replied, "as I have no interest in yours.  Call me Doomsday* or Armaggedon.  Ragnarok would be fine, too."

"How about 'Egotrip'?" Faerie muttered.

Abomination scowled and glowered at her, then suddenly Faerie's right wing bore burnt streak on it, and she fell to the ground.  Abomination may have moved to fast for mundane eyes to see, but Cloak saw -- just barely, though.

"Faerie!" Cloak heard Horse, Block, and Guy shriek.

Goom, however scuttled up, and, even though Cloak had locked his eyes on Abomination and hadn't moved his head a nanometer, he knew she'd be okay.

"No," Cloaky said, his voice colder than Pluto's surface, "you're an Abomination, so Abomination you will be!"

Abomination now scowled at Cloak, who wasn't so easily intimidated.

"You were a schoolyard bully," Cloak continued, "you were always a bully. But you didn't like it when somebody stood up to you, did you, you little punk?"

Cloak's eyes were starting to build up with golden-scarlet energy once again.  Then the energy started to leak off his eyes in fiery tendrils.  Cloak roard his feline roar, a definite warning sign.

"I am the ultimate being, you worthless piece of [Realm Walker cussing]!  I am the premier creation!  I am the strongest of the strong!"

"You are wrong. You always were." Cloak said with gritted teeth, trying to control his emotions.

But it was too late.  Abomination's mere presence brought up painful memories, and a rage that Cloak thought he had long suppressed. It was just too much.  Too much to handle.

"Oh shi--" Parker began.

"Run!" Blue shouted, realizing was was gonna happen.  "Get away! Cloak's goin' into berserker mode!"

Cloak lost control of himself, but he was dimly aware of the RAFians evacuation to the Animorphs board -- it was furthest away.  A ball of air engulfed Cloak like a shield.  The water in the nearby lake swished, sloshed and whirled violently.  The earth begun to shake with minor tremors. Trees sprouted up randomly only to burst into flame. Metal objects just shattered as if they were frozen in liquid nitrogen and then hit with a hammer.

And try as he might, Cloak could not regain control over himself!  Abomination didn't seem concerned, as he used his stolen powers of superspeed and levitation to evade Cloak.

"You're losing yourself! Get control! Now!!"

"G-grandfather . . . ?"

"NOW!!!"

SNAP!  Cloak found that he was mastering his emotions, calming himself down.  Regaining control of himself . . . he would have thought that he had mastered this by now.

"Pathetic display," Abomination sneered.

"I didn't ask for your critique," Cloak said shortly, trying not to flare up like that again.

"Well, I suppose it's my turn now."

Suddenly, Cloak felt punches and kicks but could not react from them.  There wasn't enough time to react. Cloak could not defend himself, he could barely form a single thought. It was no time before his ichor started flowing, burning the ground black.  His clothing was being stained dark gold.

He was unaware that the RAFians were trickling back.  He was unaware of many things at that point. At one point, he fell, but stubbornly returned to his feet.  This happened five more times.  On the seventh fall, Cloak did not rise again.  He remained on the ground, cloak nearly all stained gold.

Abomination, who was breathing heavily, gave a loud whoop and cackled madly.  "I finally did it! I finally did it!  CLOAK IS DEAD!!"

"No . . ." Parker muttered horrified.

----------
*[spoiler]Reference to what this storyline is loosely parodying.[/spoiler]

Cloak:
Sorry for the double-post, but I want to add another chapter.  Forgive me.

CHAPTER FIVE:
The Evacuation
"RAFian fools," Abomination shouted, still clearly full of glee, "your mightest warrior has fallen."

It wasn't true, Cloak was no better a warrior than any other RAFian, but Abomination carried an old Realm Walker prejudice, where they think of Realm Dwellers as lesser beings.

"He's gone!  He won't come back.  Take his remains and go.  If you continue to fight . . . you will be annihilated."

Richard's face was a mask, his face was inscrutable, his thoughts a mystery.  But he was clearly thinking hard about this, weighing his options, and . . . finally coming to a decision.  A hard decision that he knew would not be popular.

"Ash.  Demos.  Take Cloak's . . . take Cloak, and let's go."

"We can't just give up RAF!" SuperNate declared.

Richard didn't say anything for a moment, then said, "What other option do we have?  Cloak died trying to defeat Abomination.  What chance to we have against him?"

Blue looked conflicted and . . . confused.  But he stayed quiet because, if he was right, he didn't want to alert Abomination.  Blue had remembered something Cloak had once told him about Realm Walkers.

Ash and Demos lifted Cloak up, their regenative abilities healing any damage that Cloak's ichor inflicted on them -- exactly why Richard had assigned them to the task.  There was a cheer from the Banned and the trolls as the RAFians pulled out of RAF.

They found refuge in a makeshift village, not that unlike Knothole Village from the comic Sonic universe, only entirely underground.  Cloak's remains were placed in an isolated spot -- a makeshift morgue-slash-infirmary.

While Cloak was the only one thought slain, a few more were injured.  Fairie was having Goom repair her wing.  Noelle's left stalk eye had a burn salve on it.  Horse was cut up, but she would live.  Gaz had several lacerations, and a minor concussion.  Block had his arm in a sling.

"This would be easier if I had arms!" Goom had lamented.

The other RAFians were milling around, looking miserable at losing the site . . . and friend, they cared for so much.  Parker took off his helmet -- he was unhurt, but his armor looked like hell.  Esplin struck the wall with his tail-blade in fury.  Guy was attempting to console Horse.

It seemed very bad, that they've become refugees.  But it could have been worse, they said, they could have been . . .

Blue still looked conflicted, but he was relatively unscathed.

"Blue, what's on your mind?" Terenia said, but he gaze was that of a teacher who caught a student passing notes in her class.

". . . Nothing," Blue said repressively.

"Don't be that way," she replied, "tell me."

"I . . . I don't think Cloak's dead."

Terenia took on a more gentle, consoling tone, "Blue, we'd all love that to be true, but the circumstances indicate --"

"I know what it looks like." Blue snapped.  "Cloak told me once that Realm Walkers were born of energy, and they die as energy."

"He also said that Realm Walkers can only be killed by another Realm Walker." Terenia said, resuming her teacher-tone.  "Abomination was another Realm Walker.  Maybe he knew of a way to kill him without Cloak turning into energy."

"Perhaps," Blue conceded.  "But my gut tells me otherwise."

"Your gut, or your hope?"

Darth Revan:
Killing the hero in the first act? Bold. I can't wait for more.

Cloak:
But am I really dead?

*Sly smile.*

Well, we'll find out more in upcoming chapters.  Which I'll post tomorrow.  Kinda feeling tapped creatively for now.

Er, never mind that, I lied.

CHAPTER SIX:
Epiphany Road
Cloak blinked and looked around.  Where was he?  There was nothing familiar about this place.  There was nothing but swirling gray mist all around.  Cloak felt a hard smooth surface beneath his feet.

It was sometime before he realized the hood of his cloak was down, but nothing was happening.  Cloak tried to remember what happened to land him in this strange place.  Then he recalled being beaten by Abomination. . . .

Did Abomination kill him?  Was he really . . . dead?  His stomach plummeted as he realized that . . . that he must be . . . .

"Cloak," a voice said.

Cloak's head snapped to up, in attention.  He recognized that voice.  A voice he had not heard for several years.  A voice he never thought he would hear again.

"Cloak," the voice said again.

Cloak daren't believe it.  He could not.  His hands begun to tremble incredibly with sheer anticipation and excitement.  He may see him again after all.

"G-grandfather . . . ?" Cloak called out tentatively.

Then, from the mist, another figure appeared.  He had a sharp, curled beak with a white feathered head, black feathered wings, powerful black feathered hands.  Round, golden eyes.  His feet had curled black talons.  But he was smiling benignly.

Cloak, unable to restrain himself any longer, launched himself to the figure and gave him a bone-crunching hug, which Sage, Cloak's grandfather, father of Ursa, returned.

"I . . . I . . ." Cloak spluttered.

"I know," Sage replied.

Then Cloak pulled away when he realized he failed to defeat Abomination.  And in doing so, he let his grandfather down.  That he would never be as worthy as his heroic, mighty grandfather.

"No, Cloak.  Don't think that way."

"How did you know --"

"You are feeling the things that we Elements Masters are usually cursed with feeling." Sage said succinctly.  "But you mustn't blame yourself."

Cloak heard his words but wasn't sure he could stop himself from that.  Sage seemed to recognize this, and sighed deeply.  He placed one of his feathered hands on Cloak's shoulders.

"I should have known that it wouldn't be that easy for you.  It wasn't for me.  We Elements Masters tend to run from our feelings, hide from them, even fear them.  But there is only one course for you now.  You must go onto the Epiphany Road."

"The . . . the epiphany road."

"Yes, only then you can make your very important decision."

"My -- what decision?"

"I believe you know."

"Tell me." Cloak said, who wasn't sure he knew.

"You know, Cloak.  The decision of whether to go back or go on."

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