Eternal Hope

Eternal Hope
Chapter 3

Seamus stumbled into the bar, one arm around the blond haired hooker he had run into a few hours ago.
He walked through the doorway, nearly falling onto her. She laughed.
“Had a little too much to drink, Shay?” she asked, laughing.
He smirked at her. “Nah. I could down a few more.” He gave her a cocky grin. “And I’m told that the drunker I get, the feistier I get too.”
She raised an eyebrow. “Well, in that case, lets go see if Charlie likes us today.”
Seamus laughed. “Baby, with those breasts, any male on the planet will like you, trust me.” He slurred.
She laughed again.
He shook his head, trying to clear the fuzziness inside. There was something he had to do right now. He couldn’t remember for the life of him what it was though. Oh yeah! He had to find Pez. The new shipment of drug supplies which had come in just the other day had turned out to be crap. The new batch of Flash he had to have whipped up by tomorrow had been impossible to piece together from the few bottles of good stuff which he had to weed out from the crap the guy had delivered him.

* * *

After serving their prison term, Pez and him had gone back to the city. Both of them had refused to go back to running, even though Sib had tried to convince them to get back into it. They had gone back to their old home which had lain in ruins since they had last left it.
For the months that followed, they lived off of the money they had left over from their running days, and both of them learned how to cope with how their lives had changed while in prison. Pez had turned to making as many dirty deals as possible, ripping off, bribing and blackmailing anybody with money. Sometimes Seamus would go along with him, but mostly, he was too drunk to notice.
Seamus had turned to alcohol to get rid of all the messed up feelings inside of him.
Alcohol, women and sex were how he lived.
But when their money ran out, they had to find a different way to make a living. Pez had immediately thought of getting back into the drug trade. Seamus had refused, until Pez had explained that they wouldn’t do the running now. They’d have their own little business. Pez would get the orders, Seamus would make the drugs, and Pez would deliver them.
After thinking it over, Seamus had agreed. From his two year running stint, Seamus knew how to make every single drug on the planet.
Word of their business spread through the city like wildfire. Pez suddenly found people trekking from miles away to find them. Not only the locals anymore.
And the money was slowly pouring in.

Seamus collapsed onto the bar stool, the blond sitting down next to him. He fuzzily ordered a beer. The blond laughed and started running her hands up and down his chest.
“Let’s go somewhere more private.” She whispered into his ear.
Seamus grinned. “Not now, sweetie. Gotta wait for Pez to show up first.”
She started kissing his ear. “Who’s Pez?”
He moved over slightly and grabbed the beer Charlie shoved at him. “Just a friend of mine.”
“Dirty business?”
“Kinda.”
He glanced around the bar, trying to get her hands away from the dangerous parts of him. He was too drunk to properly control himself. There was no way he was gonna screw her here, in front of everybody.
Where the hell was Pez? He looked around and suddenly saw his friend walking towards him, laughing and talking to other people along the way.
“Shay!”
Seamus waved him over.
Pez came and sat down next to him and ordered a beer from Charlie. He glanced at the hooker, giving her a brief nod.
Seamus managed to disentangle himself from her.
“Kera bernaia.” He slurred, trying to clear his mind as he gulped down the beer. (I gotta talk to you.)
“Scherk iachki berna?” Pez asked, giving him a worried look while grabbing his own beer. (About what?)
“Scherk da richkia.” (About the drugs.)
“Perf ka ria gernachia?” (Did you get the shipment?)
“Kiop gernachia neri ba.” (It’s not the shipment.)
Pez frowned at him over his beer glass.
“Scherk da richkia?” (About the drugs?)
Seamus smiled. “Bura da retchka per, fura gler.” (That’s what I just said, deaf man.)
Pez chuckled. “Merda gerchia bura tera?” (What about them?)
“Dera querta mento.” (They’re crap.)
“Mento?” Pez’s eyebrow shot up. (Crap?)
Seamus nodded. “Pera derto gerschkia menia orega cura terop.” (I can’t make the Flash we need for tomorrow)
Pez swore and started drumming his fingers on the counter. He ordered himself another beer.
The hooker was started to nibble on his ears and her hands were starting to really wander. Seamus grabbed her hands and gently pushed her off.
“Not now, sweetie. Wait until I’m good and drunk, okay?” She frowned at him with pouty lips but promptly backed off.
He turned to Pez. “I can go see Sib tomorrow. He’ll probably give us the stuff I need.”
Pez stopped drumming his fingers and grinned at Seamus. “Shay, you’re a fucking genius when you want to be, you know that?”
Seamus grinned at him but stopped smiling when he suddenly felt the hookers hands on his pants. He grabbed her hands.
“Okay, okay, honey. We can go now.” He said, downing the rest of his beer and giving Pez a nod before disappearing through the back door.

The next morning, he woke up with a splitting headache. Damn hangover, he grumbled as he looked around himself. His shirt and pants were lying on the floor beside him and he was lying on a bed he had never seen before in his life. The blond hooker was quietly sleeping beside him.
He softly pushed himself off the bed. He leaned over and gave her a soft kiss on the cheek before rummaging through his pants and pulling out a few thrones which he stuck into her hand.
Quickly pulling on his shirt and pants, he opened the door of the dingy apartment and quietly walked out, yawning and praying for his headache to go away.

When he arrived at Sib’s place, he gave the customary three knocks on the door. A big burly man opened the door and frowned down at him, but within seconds, recognition spread across his face.
“Shay! Damn it’s good to see you. The boss man has been asking about you.”
Seamus gave him a grin. The guy was one of his regular crystal buyers.
“How’ve you been Curly?”
The guy nodded his head happily. “Life’s pretty damn good. Got my beer from Charlie and my crystal from you. Life couldn’t be better.” He lead him down a dirty hallway where one single lightbulb hung off a chain. He opened a busted door which barely hung on its hinges.
“Boss man’s in there.”
Seamus gave Curly a brief smile and walked into the room.
Sib was sitting at his desk, mulling over some figures on a piece of paper. He glanced up.
“Shay! Good to see you. Sit down.”
Seamus perched on the filthy chair which sat in front of the desk.
“So,” Sib said, looking up at him and shuffling some papers around. “Is this a social call or a business call?”
“Business.”
Sib nodded. “My favourite kind. What can I do for you?”
“I need to get a shipment of Flash ingredients from you. Just a few miligrams of propyl, crustana and some triana. The shipment Pez got the other day was such crap that I can’t piece even a miligram of Flash together from it.”
Sib nodded. “When do you need these things by?”
“As soon as possible. The stuff was supposed to be ready by today, but I can push it off. I know the people who want it. They’re pretty lenient.”
Sib nodded, a smile spreading across his face. “No problem, Shay. I owe you and Pez big time anyway. The only reason I’m still in business and not doing hard time like you two did was because you didn’t rat me out. I’ll always owe you one.”
Seamus smiled at him. “In that case, my life will be pretty good from now on.”
Sib laughed and walked towards the door. “Let me go see about those ingredients right now. I might have some in stock right now.”

Seamus leapt through the window of the basement room where Pez and him still lived. Pez was standing by the table on which all of Seamus’s drug supplies and tools lay. The mattress still lay in the corner and a small old stove stood beside it. They never used it to cook things on, they just used it for warmth on cold nights. A lone lightbulb swung from the chain it was hooked on, the only light in the small room.
Pez looked up from where he was writing something down on a piece of paper.
“Hey. I got some more orders. A couple of newbies want some Flash, and Charlie would like some Nethyl.”
Seamus nodded and went over to the table. “By when?”
“They said they didn’t care, but the newbies sounded a little edgy.”
Seamus sat down in front of his table and swept aside some empty bottles and used needles and eye droppers which littered the surface. He rummaged around in one of the drawers and pulled out a bottle labelled Triana. He carefully measured out the required 17 miligrams and mixed it into a glass jar where the rest of the ingredients for Flash were already there. He gently took the jar and shook it. He held it up to the light and shook it some more. He frowned at it. It was too white. Taking the eye dropper again, he added two more miligrams of Triana to the mixture. Shaking it again, he held it up to the light. He smiled. Perfect.
He carefully put he bottle aside and grabbed another one.
Pez glanced over at him. “I’ll run over to the bar and buy us some dinner.”
“Sounds good.” Seamus answered, barely looking up from where he was measuring out 17 miligrams of Triana again. “Tell Charlie I say hi.”
Pez grinned at him and leapt out of the window, disappearing down the street.

Seamus walked into the dimly lit bar and sat down on a bar stool. “Hey, Charlie.” He said, nodding at the bartender.
He rummaged around in his pocket and pulled out the vial of Nethyl he had thrown together the night before.
“Here, Charlie. The Nethyl you wanted.”
Charlie eagely walked over to him and was about to rip the vial out of his hand when Seamus yanked it back, out of his reach, and instead, held out his other, empty, hand towards the bartender.
Charlie sighed but still reached into his apron pocket and pulled out a few thrones. He slowly counted out the right amount and handed it to Seamus. He smiled and stuck the money into his pocket and lightly tossed the drug over to Charlie.
Charlie grabbed it and stuffed it into his pocket before turning around to the taps.
“A beer, Shay?”
“Sure.”
While he sat there, sipping his beer and looking around for any available hookers, he noticed a guy sitting next to him. He looked him up and down.
The guy was dressed in filthy clothes, his hair long and tangled.
But he didn’t look any worse that he did, Seamus thought, sipping his beer.
Although having a good, regular job brought in more money than begging and stealing had, Seamus and Pez still looked like filthy street rats. Their clothes were crappy and dirty and they were still stick thin. They still didn’t manage to get food everyday. They had the money, but not everybody had the food.
He smiled. Such irony. No matter if you were rich or poor, you still had to go hungry. Man, what a messed up place.
He glanced at the guy again. He was basically lying on the filthy bar top, three empty rum glasses sitting in front of him. Yup, this guy was good and drunk.
He let his eyes wander around the dimly lit bar again. He spied a brunette hooker standing in the corner, staring around with hopeful eyes.
He was about to call her over when he felt his pockets and realized they were empty except for the money Charlie had just given him. Nope, that had to buy him and Pez dinner tomorrow. He couldn’t waste it on a hooker. Damn.
The guy beside him slowly lifted his head up and called Charlie over.
“Kerischia bena trubes.” He said fuzzily, swaying in his seat.
Seamus’s head snapped around and he stared at the guy. Charlie was staring at him too, frowing in confusion.
“What the hell did he say?”
Seamus didn’t take his eyes off the guy. How did this low life know how to speak Dyrillian? Nobody around here knew how.
“The guy wants another rum.” Seamus said absentmindly to Charlie. He reached over and shook the guy’s shoulder.
“Mena, isti bura kerit Dyra?” he asked, keeping his voice low. (Hey, how do you know Dyrillian?)
The guy turned his head and stared at him, a small smile spreading across his face.
“I’m sorry, laddie. Didn’t mean to start spouting it like that. When I’m drunk I forget.”
Seamus shook his head, still staring at him. “No, I mean, how do you know how to speak it?”
The guy laughed. “I was taught, my boy.”
“By who? Nobody around here can speak it.”
He smiled. “The cult taught me.”
“What cult?” he asked, frowning at him. Was this guy totally drunk? But no, that had been genuine Dyrillian. He couldn’t have faked it.
“You ain’t never heard of the cult before?”
He shook his head, taking a sip of his beer. “Can’t say I have.”
“Oh, so you’re one of the silent ones, huh?”
That statement convinced Seamus that this guy wasn’t a phoney. That had been the same way Daxus had described him.
“Well, my boy. You’ve been missing out. Yup, yup. Missing out.”
“On what? Would you fucking start talking straight?”
“Sorry. Bit drunk, matey. Bear with me. There’s this cult. Enormous by now, spread round the whole world. Called Crystallia. Biggest cult anybody’s ever seen.”
Seamus raised an eyebrow. A cult named hope?
“Started by some old guy whose sitting in jail right now. Some terrorist attack or something. You wouldn’t know him.”
Seamus tried to hide his grin. So that’s what Daxus had been doing before his attack. The old geezer had made a cult. He glanced at the drunk but didn’t feel like getting into the details on how he had sat in a jail cell with the creator of the largest cult on earth for one whole year.
“What does this cult do?”
“Oh, all kinds of things. Mostly we try to over throw the Nietzschy’s. Small revolts, demonstrations, protests. That sort of thing. But mostly, it’s for spreading hope.”
“Hope, huh?”
“That’s right. Small thing for the people in it. It gives ‘em some hope that they’re part of something like that. They like the feeling it gives ‘em. Feelings of power which they ain’t never had before.”
Seamus stared at the guy, having forgotten about his beer. Slowly, an idea was starting to form in his mind. Here was the perfect way to get back at them.
For the years of torture, abuse and oppression they had thrown at him. For having killed Osim and so many other people he had cared about. For having pulled him through hell countless times.
He smiled. A bitter, hard smile. Here was a way to get back at them. Revenge. What a sweet, sweet word.
He turned back to the drunk. “So,” he inquired, trying to sound casual. “How can a person join this cult?”

* * *

Seamus sat on the mattress, leaning against the stove and clutching his arm, trying to keep from screaming. Pez was lying on the mattress by his feet, also clutching his arm and moaning quietly.
Pez looked up and stared at him, a hard smile on his face.
“It’s all worth it, Shay.” He said, between clenched teeth.
Seamus smiled back, hatred burning in his eyes. Oh, how he loved revenge. Ignoring the pain in his arm, he kept on smiling.

* * *

After the old drunk had told him where the next Crystallia meeting would be, Seamus had taken off like a shot, forgetting about his beer, and racing across the dark streets, tripping over drunks along the way and ducking out of the night patrols way as he ran home. As soon as he had hurled himself through the window of their home, he had madly started blabbering his idea to Pez.
Pez had been sitting on the mattress, quietly smoking a cigarette. He had wordlessly stared at him, a small smile on his face, obviously thinking he was drunk. But as it slowly dawned on him that he was being serious, he had stopped smiling and had sat up straight.
When he was done talking, he collapsed onto the ground, gasping for breath.
Pez stared at him. “Shay, I think that this is your best idea yet. Over all these years, this has got to be the winner.”
Seamus sat up, still grinning. “Your bet your ass it is. Now, hand me that smoke.”
Still smiling, Pez handed him the cigarette.

The next night, they had gone to the meeting at an old abandoned building that looked almost exactly like their own house did.
“Only, ours smells better.” Pez had whispered, causing Seamus to laugh so hard he had nearly fallen into people coming through the door behind him.
They had been amazed by the sheer number of people who had showed up. And the kinds of people who had showed. Not only street bums and drunks and druggies, but also business men. A lot of their richer customers were there, calmly sitting amongst filthy street urchins and hookers, talking to them as if this were the crowd they sat with everyday. It was amazing. And what was even more amazing was how all of these people spoke Dyrillian. Fluently too.
“Holy crap, this is amazing.” Pez breathed, staring around, wide eyed.
Then the leaders had stood up and the room had gone silent. A few coughs here and there, but other than that, all eyes turned towards the front where three older people stood, smiling and looking at the crowd.
They were wearing long black robes, covering their clothing, but from their hair and the way they held their heads, Seamus knew that they weren’t street bums.
The person standing in the middle stepped forward and smiled at the crowd. Then he started to speak. Seamus wasn’t surprised to hear him speaking in Dyrillian. Not one word of common.
“Welcome people of Earth. I welcome you all with open arms. The oppressed, the poor, the hurt, the hungry, the rich who are still deeply scarred. I welcome you all. Tonights meeting is not only for discussing the protest which we have organized to occur in three weeks, but to also welcome two of our newest members.” He held out his arms and nodded at Pez and Seamus.
Seamus gulped. What the hell were they going to do to them?
A second later, he found out. Pez was already walking through the crowd of people, dragging him along behind him.
“Come on, Shay. This is what we both want, remember?” Pez whispered.
Seamus swallowed his fear and bravely walked through the people. The old hatred had seeped back into him and made him stronger. Oh yes, this was what he wanted.
After they had walked up to the front, the leaders helped them up onto the platform they were standing on.
“State your names, still silent ones.”
Pez stared at him, having lost his ability to speak. Seamus rolled his eyes. God damned idiot. Always running into things head first, only thinking about what he was doing years after he had done it. He sighed. Well, that’s why he was here. To bail Pez out of all the crap he ran them into.
“Seamus Harper.” He said, giving the man a smile. Pez still hadn’t found his voice. Seamus pointed at him. “And his name’s Pez Madden.”
The man smiled at both of them gently. Seamus saw some of the fear leave Pez’s face. Good, now both of them were ready for whatever happened.
“The welcoming ceremony is relatively simple. You’ll take a few oath’s, you’ll get the mark, and then you will join the people again. You will no longer be silent.”
Seamus stared at him, keeping the smile on his face. Oath? Mark? What the hell was the guy talking about? Oh well, at least they wouldn’t be silent anymore. Whatever the hell that meant. Way to go, us.
The man held up his right hand, making his middle finger and thumb connect in a circle and keeping his other three fingers straight.
“This is our signal.” He said.
Both Pez and him twisted their fingers around until they had their hands the same way. Seamus smiled at Pez. He had a feeling everything was going to be alright.
The man shuffled a few papers around and cleared his throat.
“Do you swear to fight for the freedom of your home planet?”
“We-” Seamus started, but then seeing Pez’s open mouth, staring at the guy in shock, he kicked him. Pez closed his mouth and blinked a few times.
“We do.” They both said, keeping their fingers absolutely still.
“Do you swear to fight for the freedom of your people?”
“We do.”
“Do you swear to willingly sacrifice your own lives in order to achieve this freedom?”
Seamus’s eyes glittered bitterly. How sweet revenge tasted. He didn’t care about the consequences, he didn’t care what would happen next. All he wanted was revenge.
“We do.”
The man nodded and put the papers down. He slowly moved his hand closer to Seamus’s and gently touched the tips of his three outstretched fingers with his own. He then did the same to Pez.
“This is our secret handshake. It is a way to greet other members and to identify each other.”
He put his hand down and cleared his throat, giving them a smile.
“Now that you have sworn yourselves in and your voices are now eternally part of Crystallia, you are no longer silent. You have sworn to give us your voice to fight for the freedom which we all want.”
Seamus smiled. He was liking this better and better every minute.
The man turned around and addressed the crowd, raising his hand again.
He held his hand up for the crowd to see, his fingers twisted in that strange signal.
“For freedom!”
The crowd immediately held up their hands in the same signal and echoed his words. “For freedom.”
“For freedom.” Seamus whispered, tasting the sweet words.
This is for you, Osim.
And for me too.

Hours later, Seamus and Pez weren’t feeling as excited as they had been.
They had been given the mark.
At first, he hadn’t understood what they were talking about, but after glancing around and seeing the few people who were sitting there with no shirts on, he saw what he meant.
On all of their right arms, there were three small black stars, burned into their skin in the shape of a triangle. Each star was at one of the tips of the triangle.
Seamus stared at the mark. His mind was still so full of the oaths which were ramming around in his mind, that he wasn’t even aware of being gently pushed into a chair and having his filthy shirt being pushed up. Even when he heard the hiss of the glowing red iron being brought closer to him, feeling the heat on his face, he was still mumbling the word ‘freedom.’
But when the iron first made contact with his skin and he felt his skin burning and smelt the burning flesh, he was shocked back to the present. He closed his eyes and bit his lip, determined not to scream. He groped around with his left hand, searching for something to hang onto. He felt a hand and dug his nails into it, sweat pouring down his face.
He didn’t let go of the hand, even when he felt blood dripping from his fingers.
He moaned in pain and tried not to smell that smell. It reminded him of how his cousins had smelt when he had to burn their infested bodies. Man, how long ago that seemed. It didn’t seem like it had only been four years.
Finally, it was over.
He kept his eyes clenched shut, small hisses of pain coming out of his mouth, when he heard a gentle voice coaxing him back to reality.
“Hey, Shay. It’s okay. It’s over. You lived through it. Shit, man. You fucking buried your fingers in my hand. Crap, that hurt. Shay. Open your eyes. It’s okay. It’s over.”
Slowly, he opened his eyes. He gingerly took his hand off of Pez’s hand which was covered in blood. He wiped the sweat off his face, still gasping for air.
“Sorry about the hand, Pez.”
Pez shrugged. “Nothing you wouldn’t have done for me.” He smiled.
Seamus laughed, remembering the first time Pez had told him that so long ago.
Slowly, he pushed himself off the chair and Pez sat down in it. Seamus glanced at him. He was the only person in the room who could see the small glint of fear in his friends eyes.
After Pez’s sleeve had been rolled up, he clenched his eyes shut and bit down hard on his lip. Seamus saw the glowing red iron slowly being brought closer to his arm, the he smelt the smell of burnt flesh as the first star was burnt into Pez’s arm. Pez hissed in pain.
Wordlessly, Seamus held out his hand. Pez grabbed hold of it, clenching it so hard that blood started seeping through is white fingers.
Seamus didn’t move away.

* * *

Pez moaned. “Man, I want a beer.” He said, gingerly sitting up, being careful not to use his right arm.
Seamus smiled. “Me too. But it ain’t like we could walk from here to the bar. Everybody would be asking us why we were moaning in pain and looking like hell.”
He nodded.
Seamus stared down at his arm. The three black stars looked up to him. The skin around the stars was still burnt and red and swollen. But it looked good. He grinned. They had really done it.
They were going to get their revenge.
He slowly held out his right arm, grimacing from the pain, but ignoring it. He slowly made the signal with his hands.
Pez looked up and very gingerly brought up his right hand too. They gently touched their three upright fingertips together in the secret handshake of the cult.
“This is for Osim.” Seamus whispered. And for me, he added silently, remembering the countless whippings, the beatings, the laughter.
“This is for my parents.” Pez whispered too, both of their eyes staring at their touching fingers.

* * *

Seamus gently landed the little glider on the ground. Pez was leaning over the back of the piloting chair, staring out.
“Wow. Never seen so many people in my life.” He said sarcastically, looking around at the empty darkness.
Seamus smiled. They had just landed at a docking station near a Nietzschean ammunitions factory.
This had been the revolt which had been talked about in earnest for the past few weeks.
At first, it had seemed impossible to organize. Nobody had a glider, nobody could fly the thing if they had one, and nobody had the explosives they needed. It had seemed hopeless until Pez had stepped up and volunteered to find the glider. Seamus had right away said he’d fly it.
The very next day, they had gone to Sib and asked to be loaned a small glider for just two days. Sib had made them swear to bring it back in on piece and to keep it away from any Nietzscheans.
Well, Seamus thought as he turned off the engines and opened the airlock, Sib would probably get his first wish, but not the second.
Silently, a hoard of people ran up to the glider, all wearing dark clothes. They ran to the airlock and started hauling out the huge boxes of explosives which Pez was handing them. It reminded Seamus of their drug running days.
He pushed himself out of his chair and walked over to the door. He lightly jumped to the ground and secured the door again.
“Keria benacha?” He whispered to Pez, tying a black bandanna around his shining blond hair. (All the boxes out?)
“Tescha.” Pez whispered back, pulling the bandanna over a lock of hair Seamus had forgotten. (Yeah.)
They walked up to the crowd of silent, dark people.
Seamus held up his hand in the signal. Wordlessly, the first man came forward and did the signal too. Silently, their fingertips touched in the secret handshake.
“Ureka.” The man nodded. (Hello.)
“Ureka.” He answered, keeping his voice low.
The man looked around, his eyes scanning the darkness.
“Peria nescha kuru teri werta munasca membo ureta serak.” He whispered. (Let’s get to work. We’ll hide the explosives under the factory, you and your friend stay here and light the fuse when I say.)
Seamus nodded. It was playing time.
The men all started opening the boxes, taking out armloads of the dynamite and swiftly running through the darkness towards the factory.
Pez and him crouched down behind some bushes, watching the dark figures running around. They were so quiet that Seamus couldn’t even hear them.
Pez squeezed his hand as the men started running back towards them.
“It’s playing time.” He whispered, his pale eyes glinting in the darkness. Seamus smiled bitterly. Oh, it was playing time alright.
He found himself regretting the fact that there weren’t any Nietzscheans inside the factory at the moment. But as Pez had reasoned, it was better to destroy their weapons rather than them. Without their weapons, they were powerless. Seamus hadn’t agreed with that last point, but he had grungingly agreed that it was a start.
Finally, the man who had spoken to them ran over to them, crouching behind a bunch of bushes.
There was a hard smile on his face.
“Turaka bena.” (We’re ready.)
Pez dug around in his pocket and pulled out a lighter.
Seamus took it as the man handed him the end of the black fuse. He smiled as he flicked the lighter on. Pez was smiling too, revenge flickering across his face as the shadows danced across his face. Seamus’s eyes glinted bitterly as he heard that laughter in his mind. That eternal laugher. God, how he hated them.
Slowly, he stuck the fuse into the lighter. With a hiss, the fuse lit and the bright flame started racing swiftly down the wire. They’d stop laughing soon enough.
Seamus jumped up, throwing the lighter into his pocket and started madly running towards the glider, Pez at his heels.
He ripped open the airlock and they leapt in. But just before he slammed the door shut, he turned back, the bandanna still firmly tied around his head. Pez paused too and stared at the factory.
Suddenly, starting with a quiet rumble and then growing louder, the entire building exploded with a deafening blast. Flames, dust, bricks and boxes flew through the air, some even hitting the glider as the air around them echoed from the explosion. Seamus covered his eyes and ducked as a piece of plywood came hurling towards them. It hit the side of the glider and fell onto the ground. He slowly uncovered his eyes and stared at the burning building, all the sides slowly collapsing in as the black walls crumbled. In the distance, he could see the forms of Nietzscheans madly running around, screaming in rage.
Seamus smiled. The bastards weren’t laughing anymore.
Suddenly, he leaned forward, not caring whether they saw him or not. Keeping a hand clutching the handle to keep him from falling, dust still flying through the air, he stared at the running Nietzscheans.
“Crystallia Roxia!” he screamed, not giving a damn whether they heard him or not. Pez cheered madly and laughed.
Seamus’s cry echoed over the empty ground, merging with the dust and the flames which licked at the crumbled wallls.
“Crystallia Roxia!” he screamed again, before giving another cheer and then leaping into the glider. Pez gave another wild cheer and slammed the airlock shut.
Seamus leapt over the back of the piloting chair and turned the engines on.
Seconds later, they were flying through the air, back home.


Eternal Hope Chapter 4
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