"Renegade."

Her mind was filled with light and color, or less her mind was filled, and more than her mind expanded to fill, drawing out and away from her body as all her earthly ties were cut. For a moment, she thought she could see a distant light beckoning hr onward, glowing golden with the warmth of Revelation, which she could now see over an impossible distance.

But the light did not last, snuffed like a struggling candle.

Where once, light had been, darkness pooled up around her, drawing upwards with the slow advance of shadow at sunset.

"Renegade."

She recognized her own name, the name of the makers, and she knew the voice that spoke, spilling from the consciousness of the thing that haunted her own body. But now, the voice seemed even more familiar than it had been before, a voice connected to her own timeless eons.

A voice she was more familiar with than that of all her friends.

She watched the pooling shadow, felt the things presence as it began to gather itself, drawing up the pooling shadow like a lady draws up the voluminous skirts of a gown,and as it did, a shape began to form, a black silhouette that resembled a simple shadow.

Her own shadow.

It stood across from her, or it seemed to. She knew she wasn't in a physical place, but a sort of realm beyond that, layered on top of the one before. She was dimly aware of her surroundings, a small room that was no more than a shadow on this plane of existence, intangible and untouchable.

In that moments she knew she did not have eyes to see or ears to hear, but her consciousness required some way of understanding the world around it, and had so constructed this world from her own thoughts: an endless realm of whirling black shadow, and a dim grey sky, brightened only by a distant speck of light, now blocked from her vision by the shadow's head.

The shadow, her shadow, cocked its head thoughtfully.

"Rebel." It said again.

"What do you want?" She said, sneering at it with all the malice and hatred she could muster. This thing had made her life hell for nearly thirty years, and her wells of empathy ran dry as desert sand. Sure, they had come to an uneasy agreement over the last few months or so, but that was only out of necessity for both of them. Had the opportunity arisen, to cast off the shadow like a cloak, she would have done so with a flourish, and left the thing to perish without the aid of a host.

"Put away your anger. I am here to bring you the truth." The shadow said.

Maverick laughed.

"No you don't, the void is nothing but lies."

The shadow shook its head in disappointment, "Now that is where you are wrong. I have never brought you lies, Renegade, I have only brought you truth. It is simply this mortal coil that has clouded your memory. Could you but remember you would know the truth of my words, the things that came before, the truth that your own eyes have seen" It paused and tilted its head the other way, "The friendship that we have shared."

If she had possessed the faculties to do so, Maverick would have spit at the creature, but she didn't cross her arms over her chest.

The shadow went on, "WIth your mind clouded, you have lost all of the knowledge of your soul, been corrupted by the words of those Makers who shunned you, ignored you, and pushed you away. Now they tempt you with sweet words, and lies because they do not remember, but I promise you, the moment mortality fades from their eyes, they will remember who you are and they will reject you for it." She tried not to listen to its words, recognizing the manipulation as a poorly concealed tactic to make her doubt and lose trust in her friends.

"Go to hell." She snapped

The creature did not get angry at her, in a way it seemed almost sad, "It pains me to watch you cling to them, to the ones that do not deserve you.... To Grace." She bristled at the mention of Ramirez.

"Keep his name out of your filthy mouth!"

Again the creature shook its head, "I see that you will not see the reason of my words simply spoken, but no matter, I have come prepared with truth." Though she couldn't see it's face, Maverick would have sworn she could see it smiling at her, "The light of revelation is not the only thing that can lift the veil and grant you your sight."

And all at once Maverick was overcome with a tide of thoughts and feelings and memories, sweeping through her like a wave and dashing her human thoughts to pieces. Her human mind was simply an island against a great swell, against the ocean, a thousand years or more of memories spilling and flooding through her, filling her until she thought her mind would burst.

She tried to scream, but had no mouth to do so.

The landscape around her broke apart, fracturing into its true reality

An expanse, another dimension stretching out before her in ways that she could hardly comprehend, and with it came her thoughts and memories of thing that had gone before.

The light of revelation.

The Architect standing in rays of golden light, Warriors stretching in ranks that seemed to go on into infinity, marching across a bridge of stars in armor that glowed with the Maker's golden light, and then she remembered....

It.

The voidfather Apollyon.

Tht hing that, even now her mind could not comprehend, a creature of damnation and lies that spread across the great vastness of space, its being so horrid that she was in the same moment driven to madness and recovered from it, only to experience the madness anew as she tried to remember. She tried to fling the memory from herself, to rid her mind of the awful vision, but as she did she finally remembered.

Bitterness.

Hatred.

Jalousy.

She had lived for Eons, for time that couldn't be explained by mortal words, for it could not be comprehended. She had stood in the ranks of the Architect when there were but a dozen, before the worlds had formed from disks of sand. She had been a soldier to the Makers, a loyal commander at the head of armies, a general to heaven, but then she stood, standing still in a rolling crowd as THEY came, wreathed in golden light.

Deus.

The last cohort.

The Architect's youngest and most dearly beloved, and so when they came the crowd cheered and she was buffeted from all sides by a wave of bodies praising the ones who, unlike her, had not seen real battle. They had not seen the face of the great serpent, the destroyer, their faces were unmarked by fate. She watched, fading into obscurity as they stepped forward, taking on the great fight as if it were a simple joke, a thing to e played with, and yet the people loved them for it.

The Architect's eyes was turned more and more from her, to deal with the earrings, petty squabbles and pitiful triumphs of the last cohort, who had not earned their strength like she did.

The darkness had come to her as she stood watch above the bounds of revelation.

She had raised her spear to sent it back to the father of lies, back to its creeping darkness.

"Lower your spear oh forgotten one." and in near amusement she had paused for a time. It carried with it no weapons, and though it had no real form, it seemed to smile at her grimly, "Oh forgotten one, how the Architect does ignore your great triumphs."

She hissed at it, lifting her chin high, "I will not bow to your manipulations, creature."

It laughed, "No, perhaps not. Than let me be frank, you are a powerful one, and we have admired your abilities from afar. Even his great lord the Apollyon has noticed your fervor in battle.... Can you say the same for your own Architect?"

She tried to speak, to dash it against the darkness with her words, but found she had non, left unarmed in a battle of words.

"Busy playing with his new favorites I see, but I suppose that is the case. They will be powerful when they are ready, more powerful than you to be sure since he has granted them a great amount of strength, almost as great as you.... And in time even greater."

She felt her jaw clench.

"Do you no find it odd that he would create soldiers anew when he could simply increase the strength of his veterans....." it held up its hands, "I mean no manipulation but.... I simply point out fact. He plans to replace you, Perhaps Apotheosis will take your place, with her great fervor in battle surely she is a prime candidate.... Oer perhaps Grace will take your spot."

She sneered again at the thought.

The Void creature laughed, "Ah yes, Grace, a frivolous thing of beauty, yet.... Still more powerful than you."

She would have run it through with the tip of her spear had a pause not overcome her.

The creature may have been manipulating her, but some of the best manipulation came with a grain of truth.

They had been made special by the Architect, and she was no longer favored, cast aside and disgraced. She had not fallen all in one moment, it had been a slow process over a stretch of time that could not necessarily be quantified, but she had, convening with shadows in the darkness outside the light of revelation, but the Architect was not stupid, and when he found her, his anger had been great.

And so she was cast down, with the rest of the first cohort, and the darkness had followed after.

Her memories restored, and just as they were, she felt herself thrown backward, slammed into something hard, only to gasp to life through lungs that pulled in oxygen. Her human brain screamed and struggled against the memories of a billion eons, and she screamed with it tearing the flesh of a human body that had not been meant to hold one so ancient as her.

She could feel it, the body's terrible constricting molecules penning her in, slimy and odorous and filthy. Rebel gritted her teeth forcing out a pulse of maker energy, despite the constraints of the body, frying off the paralytic in her system, and snapping the restraints that held her in place.

Someone shouted.

She turned her head, eyes filled with the dim and shadowy vision of construct eyes.... Her terrible prison.

Her punishment.

And there she saw THEM, and her rage only grew.

Prolix, and standing at his side the Altruist, her face obscured by a blue mask.... And up above them.... Impetus, and Apotheosis. She could see them, a whirling storm of power trapped inside construct bodies.

"Maverick, Maverick, stop." Prolix said, raising all four of his terrible spidery arms

Renegade clenched her fists, forcing the maker power out through the pores of the skin, until steam filled the air around her, steam and light bursting from the pores of her skin as she rose, "Cast that filth from your mouth." She hissed, "I am not your soldier!"

Prolix and Altruist stepped back in shock, "That's not Maverick." Someone said dimly

And they were right.

"Maverick, Please!" She paused at hearing that voice, a part of her recognizing it with such familiar intimacy that it filled her insides with light, but turning her head, the light was suddenly snuffed as she saw him. He had clearly come down, and bypassing the nurses at the door had burst into the room.

Grace stood below her, his true nature manifesting even through his imperfect vessel.

He raised a hand, "please maverick, its just us, your friends. We.... its okay."

She sneered, "Friends!" And when she spoke her voice echoed, two voices overlapping, that of the construct and that of the Maker, "You who have RUINED me.... Taken what I was and laid me low."

He looked confused, mouth working, "We wouldn't.... We wouldn't do that. Yo must be mistaken."

"You simply do not remember..... But I remember.... I remember ALL."

The void creature tittered its laugh manifesting slowly from where it clung to her Anima like a terrible sort of leach. She hated the slimy feeling it gave her, but she could not get rid of it, and let it stay as it welled up from her skin like the anima power.

And now there were three voices overlapping as she spoke, "We remember, and we do not forgive.

"Maverick no!"

But Renegade had already turned and with a burst of energy, a terrible amount of energy through the dampening field of her stupid construct, she lanched herself uwpard, breaking through plaster and metal as she shot into the air and out into the night sky like a comet. The dark world of Arcadia fell below her as she burst into the sky faster and faster.

Inside her, the void creature laughed, but she mostly ignored it scanning her eys through the universe.

There in the distance, the light of revelation.

And there....

The light of Apollyon pulsating orange.

Now she knew where to go.