Beyond Gods 14 The Broken Machine

"I killed," muttered Johan feeling depressed. The blood on his hands was fresh and sticky. A reminder of his recent actions.

"No handsome," said Gadra. "You killed to save you parents. People you love and who love you. That isn't murder, that is protecting the thing you cherish most in the world. The good guys in action movies always do it. Silently, the world says what you did is okay, even if the laws say differently. Your reason was understandable and logical. You have no reason to feel guilt."

"This is different," said Johan. "No one would believe me if I told them the reason behind it. How can I explain, I was reliving this day and if I didn't kill, my parents would be killed."

"You won't have to," said Gadra. "Not if they don't know. Just let me handle the details."

"Gadra," said Johan. "I hope you are right. I don't know what to do now."

Gadra had helped him and she had yet to tell him what she'd wanted from him.

"What did you want from me?," said Johan. "You never told me."

"You've already done it," said Gadra. "Look around."

Johan looked at his surroundings and initially didn't see what she was talking about. But, upon closer inspection, the birds in the sky were frozen in place and the clouds were not moving.

Everything was silent and frozen in place. An unnatural and eerie silence surrounded them.

It was as if time had stopped for everything but them.

"What happened?," stammered Johan shocked.

"The faith machine can't figure out a way to resolve what you've done," said Gadra. "Now good things are going to happen. The things I will be able to accomplish and change are infinite!"

"Why would you want this?," said Johan.

"Unbound mana" said Gadra giggling. "I won't be restricted to being a G.o.d only in the mana well. When the faith machine gets stuck and finally figures things out, for a moment, there is a surge of free mana everywhere. I can use it to do whatever I want."

"When will time unfreeze?," asked Johan.

"Who knows," said Gadra. "For now, just walk with me."

"Where are we going?," said Johan.

"Back to the mana well of course," said Gadra.

They walked in silence. Johan was taking in the bizarreness of his situation. The world as he had previously seen it was proving to be much different from what he had accepted as reality just a week ago.

As they walked they came across a motorcycle with a key in its ignition.

Gadra got into the motorcycle and it revved to life.

"How?," said Johan surprised.

He had thought everything but them had been frozen in time.

"Don't think too hard," said Gadra. "Hop on, it is faster than walking. If I explain to you everything you don't understand, we will be here forever."

Just as Johan started climb on the back of Gadra's motorcycle the very fabric of reality seemed to tear open in front of them. Through the tear walked a familiar looking puppy. On closer inspection, Johan realised he'd seen this puppy before, it was the puppy from the alley who'd stolen his gla.s.ses.

After the puppy pa.s.sed through, the rift sealed itself as if it had never been there before.

"Ahhh!," yelped Gadra and Johan in unison surprised.

In front of their very eyes, the dog transformed into an young brunette woman with dog ears. She wore skin tight black leather uniform, had ample bossoms.

"I am Chronos keeper of this realm," barked the girl clearly frustrated, "you b.u.mpkins have broken the realm I am in charge of!"

"Well," said Gadra quickly regaining her composure, "good girls and boys don't ever get what they want. So I decided to break the rules."

"Gadra!," said Chronos looking at her coldly. "It was unstable after that monster yesterday, your antics this time are on a bigger scale. The faith machine was protecting this realm, its souls, and creatures from what is outside it! It was the only place weak creatures could live in peace!"

"Don't spout nonsense," said Gadra. "Living as dumb slaves is not peace. I am exercising my free will to get what I want."

"You two must come with me! Otherwise, things will get worse!," demanded Chronos.

"Not until I get my mana," said Gadra revving the motorcycle.

Without warning the motorcycle lurched forward and began to speed past Chronos. Johan fell off the motorcycle and landed in front of Chronos. Without looking back, Gadra continued driving leaving Johan behind.

Chronos watched Gadra drive away was a look of surprise and annoyance.

"I should have guessed that she wouldn't make things easy," muttered Chronos. "Troublemakers never make things easy."

"Who are you?," stammered Johan.

Chronos looked down at Johan, frowned and said, "I am Chronos, I am overseer of this realm."

"Why do you want me?," asked Johan.

"To see if removing the source of the problems will fix the issue," said Chronos.

With that, Chronos snapped her fingers and the s.p.a.ce around them began to distort.

Moments later, Johan found himself in a small grey bricked room, with various multicolored vortexes on its walls.

"Ah!," yelped Johan surprised.

Chronos flicked her finger and a screen appeared in front of her. A new screen appeared on the right of Chronos, showing Gadra driving the motorcycle.

"We have met before," said Johan. "Haven't we?"

Chronos tensed up momentarily, and said, "Yes. We have."

"I understand the issue currently," said Johan. "But why enter the realm previously?"

"You ...," growled Chronos clearly frustrated, "... and that fake G.o.d of a woman, have possibly broken an entire realm ... potentially gotten me fired ... and you arrogantly ask me questions?"

"But my parents were going to die!," said Johan, "I couldn't just accept faith!"

"That fake G.o.d Gadra isn't stopping," Chronos said irritated ignoring Johan.

Johan said, "Fake G.o.d?"

"Gadra was born as a human of your realm," said Chronos, "she was given the essence of old G.o.ds by the previous realm guardian that had fallen for her because of her beauty. That clearly didn't fly well with my bosses and they had him replaced by me."

Chronos turned and looked at Johan with a frown.

"I guess it doesn't really matter if I tell you," she muttered. "You can't go back."

"Can't go back?," stammered Johan. "Why?"

"Take it as a blessing," said Chronos, "Gadra wasn't lying when she said that your life would be full of disappointment. She isn't a liar, she just doesn't give people the whole story."

Johan let out a sigh.

"Getting talkative, aren't you Chronos?," boomed a sharp authoritative female voice from behind Johan.

Johan jumped surprised.

Turning around he saw red haired woman wearing a red army uniform, behind her stood five men men with red hair wearing purple army uniforms. They all had cat ears.

The red haired woman had cold green eyes that gave off an air of authority and ruthlessness.

"Admiral Armyka," gasped Chronos turning quickly and saluting her. "It is an honor for a person of your status to personally come and see me."

"Has the issue been resolved?," asked Armyka. "It is causing a commotion back at the head branch."

"No Sir," said Chronos.

"Who is the boy?," asked Armyka looking at Johan.

"He was one of the people causing the machine to act unpredictably," said Chronos. "I removed him to see if it would help the machine work normally again."

"You removed him without informing us?," growled Armyka crossing her arms frowning, "How did you plan on dealing with him, if he had decided to act up here? You never think do you?"

"I am sorry Sir," said Chronos looking to the ground ashamed.

"Now that he is in our realm and has been exposed to free mana," growled Armyka, "his mind can't be wiped and he can't be reintroduced into machine."

"I am truly sorry Sir," said Chronos, "but removing the sources of anomalies has stabilized the machine before. Ever since Romeo gave Gadra the essence of the old G.o.ds, she has been trying to break the machine ... and it is working."

"Remove her and anything else causing anomalies," growled Armyka. "I will stay here until this is completed. Pull up the anomalies now! We can't have the machine break, it is too important."

Three more floating screen appeared in the air in front of Chronos.

The first screen had Jade, on another, it Athyne, one of the men Johan had just killed, and on the last a spec of light that seemed to move with intelligence.

"A guardian spirit?," gasped Armyka. "How in the h.e.l.l did something so rare get into this realm?"

"Romeo caused a big mess," said Chronos. "These are just the anomalies I've detected now. This is all Gadra. She even reset the timeline, preventing this boy's parents from being murdered."

Armyka crumpled her eyebrows, "That isn't a trivial thing to do. Even if she was a true G.o.d, something of that magnitude isn't easy to accomplish. She is getting stronger ... stronger than we thought possible ..."

Armyka turned and looked at Johan with a disgusted look.

"Take this one away," Armyka said looking over her shoulder towards her soldiers. "Throw him into the child barracks. They'll handle him. Do it now."

A soldiers grabbed Johan by his arm lifting him to his feet and said, "Come with us."

"What should we do about the anomalies and timeline reset?," asked Chronos.

"We will kill his parents, and remove the anomalies," said Armyka coldly. "We can use their souls as a sacrifice to tame the machine. Problem solved."

"Kill my parents?," gasped Johan.

From what he'd understood. Despite being part of the machine, they were still living beings. Living beings without that much free will.

Armyka looked at Johan with a s.a.d.i.s.tic smile and then said to the soldiers, "What are you waiting for? Take him!"

The soldiers aggressively pulled Johan towards a vortex.