But you'll have to wait until the next book to see.
Now, new chapter. Last one of this book.
CHAPTER TWENTY:
Inner Knowing and GH
He was in a red and black expanse. A void of nothingness.
Cloak looked around, and saw nothing of note. He couldn't help but feel deeply disappointed. He was meditating and hoping to find Aniyu. He burned with curiosity, bursting with questions about his father's side of the family. He still knew nothing of that side of his family, and he sought to rectify this.
Behind him, a "Y"-shaped portal opened, and a newcomer stepped through. Cloak caught the person's scent and his eyes widened, pupils dilated into feline slits. He
knew that scent. He knew it for nearly thirty years before she threw him away, when he was, in her view, no longer of any use to her.
He turned around slowly, and growled, "
You."
"Is that anyway to talk to your mother?" the voice said. She still sounded the same as he remembered. Just as conceited, just as impossible to please. Cloak's innards were roiling with many emotions. Hatred, fear, sadness, pity . . . all conflicting and entangling the next. But anger . . . that was the predominate force here, as tendrils of energy began to stake their way from Cloak's eyes without him even being aware of it.
"I am no longer under your thumb," growled the Elements Master, more bestial than anything else. He prowled closer to her, like an injured animal seeking retribution. "I can speak to you in any way I deem appropriate."
"You will show me respect!"
"I
am." Cloak snarled. "I'm showing you all the respect that you
deserve,all the respect you have
earned: none."
She seemed to be aware that Cloak was approaching her in much the way a tiger would approach prey, prey to take down and kill. He was tempted. He was sorely tempted. This was the woman who caused him an enormous amount of pain and suffering. He was essentially enslaved to her, more or less, for ten years. Ten years Nexus time! That was a
century, in Dweller time.
"You wouldn't kill your old mother, would you now?"
Cloak reared to his full and considerable height, and yet, his mother was still larger than him due to her being an ursine Realm Walker, a grizzly bear, to be specific. He looked at her, still full of anger, hatred, and bitterness.
He shut his eyes, and took a deep breath, steadying himself. Then he snaoped them open, and addressed his mother -- or, rather, the oneirokinetic construct that appeared to be his mother -- and said, quite distinctly and quite plain, "No."
"What?"
"No, Mother," Cloa said. Where there was edtreme anger and hatred before, it had been inexplicably replaced and exchanged for extreme sadness and pity. Despite everything she put him through . . . despite how condemnable a person she was . . . there was one fact, one unassailable, ever-present fact that would never go away.
She was still his mother. Nothing would change that. Nothing could.
"No, Mother," Cloa repeated, as he turned away, continuing, "I'm not like you."
Cloak walked away, unaware that the void had changed to blue and white as the oneirokinetic construct of his mother vanished instantaneously, nor Aniyu emerging from an "X"-shaped portal, watching him as Cloak came out of his meditation, momentarily severing their link.
***
"Guitarhero was a mighty man,
The kind of man you'd never disrespect!
He stood 10 foot tall, wore sunglasses,
And he had a third Mark on the back of his neck!
He ate his own weight in carbon
And excreted diamonds every day!
He could throw you down a flight of stairs,
But you still would love him anyway.
Yeah, you know you'd love him anyway!
Guitarhero won the Tour de RAF
With two flat tires and a missin' chain.
He trained an Ekans to do his laundry,
I'm tellin' you the man was insane.
He could rip out your beatin' heart
And show it to you right before you died!
Every day, he'd make the host of The Apprentice
Give him a piggyback ride.
Yeah, a two-hour piggyback ride!
Giddyup, Donnie!
Ninja Warrior, Master Of The Skies!
He could melt your brain with his laser beam eyes!
Oh yeah! Oh yeah!
He had his very own line at the DMV,
Oh yeah, that was somethin' to see, I tell ya!
Guitarhero sold his toenail clippings
As a potent aphrodisiac
He ran a five-minute mile, blindfolded,
With an engine block strapped to his back.
He could eat more frozen waffles
Than any other RAFian I know!
Once he fell off an Iskoort building
And he barely even stubbed his toe.
Had a tiny little scratch on his toe.
Didn't even hurt!
Guitarhero figured out cold fusion,
But he never ever told a soul.
I've seen the man unhinge his jaw
And swallow a gyro whole.
He'd bash your face in with a shovel,
If you didn't treat him like a star,
'Cause you can spit in the wind or tug Cloak's cloak,
But, Lord knows, you just don't mess around with GH.
No, no, no!
Talkin' bout GH!
Ohh!"
"A pet project, GH?" Saffa said, smirking impishly.
GH nearly dropped his guitar. He hadn't expect a distraction or interruption at this time.
"Or did I interrupt something a bit more . . . intimate?" Saffa teased nonchalantly.
"What d'you want, Saffa?" GH said crankily.
"There's no need to be like that," Saffa said, rather bracingly.
"How else would I be toward the person who taught Leatherhead that
infernal song?"
"You can't prove that," she said, smirking like a naughty child.
