PawPaw#1, Vanilla Custard #11 + butterscotch + gummy bunnies + pineapple + peaches
Story: The Age of Heroes
Title: Happy New Year
Prompts: PawPaw #1: This is only the beginning, Red Hot Cinnamon #6: where there's smoke, Vanilla Custard #11: Sad, really, isn't it? People spend all their time making nice things, and other people come along and break them. + butterscotch + gummy bunnies (500themes #9: sensation of loss) + fresh peaches (You could feel like you're being double-crossed by a loved one today, Aries.) + fresh pineapple (So I must believe/That there's something greater than me/To keep up the fight I just got to see - Something Greater, Krosfyah)
Rating: PG13 for language, violence
Words: 1172
Characters: Crow
Summary: Takes place a few years before Dubble Bubble Bubblegum. The world is changing, only no one knows it yet but Crow. The Leviathan is the singular event to change the epochs so everything that takes place before then is butterscotch in this universe. Donghae is a city on the northeastern coast of South Korea.
Crow stopped just to the right of the big picture window at her local bar. It was New Years Eve in Las Vegas, and everyone had worked themselves into a tipsy frenzy in anticipation of a fresh start.
Her friends were already inside, taking up most of the space by the bar because they liked to be close to the alcohol. She smiled as Blue Jay, who'd made the trip all the way from Brazil for this momentous occasion, leaned over the bar himself to refill the glass belonging to the lady he was intent on kissing at midnight.
- - - - - - - - - -
No one paid any attention to the tiny streak of blue, least of all the Leviathan that was taking out Donghae like a child destroyed a block city. The bird flew high into the sky over the monster then dropped straight down. The bird shed its feathers just above the monster's giant right eye and shifted back into Blue Jay, his precious machete pointed downward in front of him.
Blue Jay stabbed the monster in the eye and twisted his body so, as gravity took hold of him, the machete dragged through the soft tissue of the monster's eye and sliced it in half.
The unholy roar of the Leviathan shook the ground. Blue Jay tried to break away but it was too late. One of the Leviathan's tentacles came up and squished the most dangerous cleric in the Amazon like a meaningless gnat.
- - - - - - - - - -
Crow dragged her gaze away from his cocky grin. It wasn't in her to cry over the death of a friend, but it wasn't just one friend she would be losing this year. Blue Jay, Yellowthroat, Song Sparrow. And those were just the ones that were here tonight. This New Year wasn't a fresh start so much as a violent end for so many of her brethren.
This was knowledge that she'd had for years about a future she'd visited a thousand times, but, as the time drew closer, the weight of that knowledge was getting so heavy that it felt like it was going to crush her before the events actually came to pass.
- - - - - - - - - -
"This is wrong!" Crow screamed at the Phoenix. "The Bird God is making a mistake!"
The Phoenix stiffened in xir chair and glared at the cleric. "Blasphemy will get you nothing but a mouth without a tongue, Lady Crow."
Crow slashed her hand down to stop the Flock's highest cleric's chatter. "Cut the bullshit, Phoenix. I've seen the future. The Leviathan isn't something that has to happen! I can stop the damn bomb myself if its secrecy that's holding you back!"
Phoenix shook xir head. "Yes, Lady Crow, you can see the future. But you cannot see the reasoning behind it. The Leviathan is not an evil caused by one's imbalance. It is a turn on the cosmos sphere. It is necessary."
Crow jumped forward, all the way to the steps of the raised dais that only the Phoenixes, the five mortals closest to the Bird God, were allowed to stand on. "And all those humans that are going to die with no understanding of what's happening? All the magicians that break 3000 years of secrecy to try and stop the Leviathan? Do you even know which of our brethren will be sacrificed in this war, Phoenix? How can you say that their deaths are necessary?"
Phoenix didn't show a flicker of remorse. "The gods have spoken," xe said. Xe pointed one gloved finger at Crow. "Do what you will to prepare for the upcoming battle but you will not prevent the Leviathan's coming, Lady Crow, or the Bird God himself with throw your soul off the spiral."
- - - - - - - - - -
Phoenixes didn't care about clerics. No one would ever see a Phoenix walking into this bar, slapping backs and shooting the breeze. They were oracles, the heads of the Flock, and they alone were privy to the wishes of the Bird God.
Crow was their opposite. She had their level of power. If she let her mind wander through the spheres of time long enough, she could see the turnings of the very spiral of reality itself. But she couldn't see gods like the Phoenixes. Instead, she saw all the people that the Phoenixes refused to pay attention to.
Crow had been standing outside for too long. Tern, a six and a half foot wall of walking muscle, caught her eye through the window and made an impatient gesture for her to come inside.
- - - - - - - - - -
"You knew," Tern growled. "You knew about the fucking nuke and you knew that it would wake that fucker up. You knew everything that was going to happen."
Crow wanted to flinch away from his accusations, the guilt he placed squarely at her feet, but she just nodded instead. "Yes."
Tern's hands clenched into fists. She wondered if he finally hated her enough to hit her. She wouldn't blame him if he did. "You bitch."
"This is the turn of the cosmos sphere," Crow said, sounding a lot calmer than she felt about uttering complete lies. "Nothing I could have said would have changed the outcome."
"Bullshit," he yelled. "That's fucking bullshit and you know it! You could have told us! We could have prepared for this instead of being blindsided like every other poor bastard on the planet! What the fuck use are you if you can't even bother to warn your own goddamn Flock!"
Crow couldn't contain her flinch this time. She had tried to warn them. She'd done everything she could to organize them. If she'd done anything more she would have tipped off the gods and they would have gotten rid of her before she could make even these meager preparations. She'd done everything she could...hadn't she?
Tern turned away from her in disgust. "Their deaths are on your head, you heartless bitch."
- - - - - - - - - -
She smiled at him, hiding the stifling guilt he hadn't even piled on her yet, and thanked the gods that he was too drunk to be as perceptive as he normally was. Instead she blew him a kiss and turned away before anyone else caught sight of her. She'd be terrible company tonight.
Crow didn't need a clock or comments from the passersby about the time. She could hear it ticking down in her own head. It was a constant reminder that this year, the year that changed everything, was coming ever closer. She wondered how much the Phoenixes really knew about the upcoming events. Did they know the Leviathan was only the beginning? It was the terrifying herald chosen by the cosmos to ring in a new age where magic wasn't humanity's biggest conspiracy and the gods weren't content with sitting on the sidelines any longer.
Crow headed home. She couldn't bring herself to ruin the party by telling her fellow magicians the real reason they needed to throw everything they had into tonight's celebration.
This was the last New Years Eve the Age of Man would ever see. The Age of Heroes was beginning.