User:Biogecko/Shadow Regime chapters

for any GMS member (especially slice) here are the old version of shadow regime's chapters

Story
"You can't be a hero forever. You either die, or you live long enough to see yourself become a villain."

- Nightwatcher

Chapter 1
"Ambassador Leviathos, we are approaching the Noctxia Guardians' base."

"Excellent," replied Leviathos. "Begin the descent immediately."

"Yes, sir," answered the guard. He began to run to the front of the ship to tell the pilots when an alarm sounded and a voice came from a loud speaker.

"We are currently being boarded by an unidentified ship. It's jamming our anti-teleporting shields. More enemies could be teleporting in soon."

"Mata Nui curse it!" exclaimed Leviathos to the guard. However, their conversation was cut short by an explosion as heat and pain surged through Leviathos' body. His eyes flashed open to see his Matoran guard blown back by a piece of debris. He turned his head again to see a large reptilian being stepping out of a hole in the ship's wall.

"Who are you?" demanded Leviathos.

"Does it really matter? I could tell you my name, but it would not matter; soon enough, you'll just know me as some odd-looking bounty hunter that took you to his employer."

"Nightwatcher?" asked Leviathos worriedly.

"Really? You're that stupid? Normally, my employers take me as at least slightly intelligent; I don't know or care how you met my colleague, but I am not him. And with that, I say good-bye." He stepped forward. His staff flashed silver with a loud whooshing noise. Leviathos heard a cracking sound and then felt pain shoot through his skull. His vision went red and his eyes forced themselves closed.

Leviathos's mind was empty. He was asleep. Then a thought stirred; it was less of a thought, but a feeling: cold. Then it combined with another, wet, as Leviathos' brain began to wake. He connected the two things. Water, his head was in water!

Then a claw grabbed the back of his neck, breaking some of the skin, and pulled it up, only to slam it back in. Leviathos opened his eyes; he was dragged up and tossed on the ground.

"Hello," said a yellow Makuta, the bounty hunter standing behind him.

"What do you want from me?" croaked Leviathos, his throat sore.

"You have been a real annoyance to some of my... friends," he said, deciding on a word, "but they are in a certain... deal... that does not let them stop you, so naturally, I volunteered to do it for them."

He then turned to whisper something to the bounty hunter, who immediately disappeared.

"So what, you're going to kill me?" questioned Leviathos his pulse quickening.

"Sadly, I cannot, as your death will raise a lot of suspicion towards my friends."

Leviathos would have asked more, but the bounty hunter reappeared with vial of mixed substances which he tossed to the Makuta, who returned a bag of money to the bounty hunter, who then teleported away. Neocrax then loaded the liquid into a hollowed-out blade like a poison.

"Good night," said Neocrax, who hit Leviathos dead in the face with a blast of shadows, temporarily blinding him. Leviathos heard a snap, then a ripping sound followed by extreme pain. He had been stabbed; the liquid coursed throughout his veins and then he passed out again.

For the second time in an hour, Leviathos awoke, but this time he was ready to fight his Makuta adversary.

''Why? The Makuta and Brotherhood of Fear are just in their actions; it was the Order of Mata Nui and those who clung to the light who are wrong.''

He looked down at this body; it was larger and stronger, and also... darker.

"He is on route to your location; everything you wanted has been completed."

"Thank you, old friend," said Kaluu over the holographic communicator.

"Now, as for the virus, it was extremely rare; I hope he was not just a test subject," said Neocrax, prying.

"No..."

"I need him to complete certain... tasks... for me," cut in Krakanus. "And, more importantly, stay out of my way when we go to the site," he finished.

"Understood."

The hologram flickered for a moment, then disappeared

"Kaluu, go prepare the others.

"Yes, sir!" replied the Makuta, who walked away. Krakanus turned his gaze to the monitors he had installed in his throne room. He changed the channels with the remote he had installed into the arm rest of his chair.

"Ah, lets see how your ex-leaders deal with you now, Noctian!" said Krakanus excitedly at the monitor after finding Leviathos. His maniacal laughter would have been heard throughout the whole base had he not had his room sound-proofed.

Chapter 2
"I understand," said Krakanus he turned to face Kaluu, who now possessed an extremely more powerful bird-like form. "I take it the experiments were a success."

"Indeed," replied Kaluu, bowing his head.

"Alright, all of you go and make ready for the trip, except for you; Leviathos you will be working with me personally from now on," finished Krakanus.

After the others left. Krakanus stared at Leviathos for a second then spoke,

"You know, this war with the other factions on this planet will be over in a few days."

"What of it?" replied Leviathos.

"Just because one war is over doesn't mean the same fight ceases to exist."

"I don't..."

"Understand," finished Krakanus. "What I mean is that when we win, there will be massive rebellion. Do you understand?"

"Obviously," replied Leviathos harshly.

"Now, do you know anything about leading an army?" pried Krakanus.

"Well, sort of. I had one in the Pit, and I was taught by the League," Leviathos replied. "And I helped in the Order of Darkness War..."

"Good, I have a new mission for you."

Chameleo's weapon shot through the air like a missile, the trident landing one or two bio away and clattering on the gray stone surface that served as the floor in the Brotherhood of Unity's new base on Noctxia Magna.

Chameleo himself landed on the rock-hard floor sharply, but had no time to recover; a plasma beam was fired at him, and he was forced to somersault over it to avoid being hit. As he landed, two more followed in rapid succession; unarmed, he was forced to rely on his Reptisapean Absorption powers; he allowed the two plasma beams to hit him, and then released them outward in a blast of his own. His enemy was thrown back, and Chameleo approached him as Jetrak got up.

"Surrender," Chameleo said, picking up his fallen staff and almost lazily pointing it at his fallen foe.

"I don't surrender so easily, Reptisapean!" yelled Jetrak, suddenly activating his twin jetpacks to fly over Chameleo's head, releasing more plasma blasts. Chameleo twirled his blades quickly, and the weapon, insulated against plasma attacks, reflected them towards the Toa.

"Neither do I," said Chameleo, and with reflexes so powerful that most beings could not have anticipated his movements, he jumped onto the wall, the microscopic suction cups in his feet allowing him to cling onto it while leaving his hands free. Jetrak had little time to react before he jumped off the wall and slammed directly into the hovering Toa, sending them both plummeting to the ground. Chameleo landed lightly on his feet, and Jetrak just barely managed to hover over the ground before he was sent falling. However, he was too low; and a light hit with the middle of his staff sent him sprawling on the floor.

"Now do you surrender?" Chameleo grinned, extending a hand to Jetrak.

The Toa took it, and Chameleo helped pull him up. "That was a nice practice round," Jetrak commented.

"You're getting slow," the Reptisapean joked, elbowing his friend lightly.

"Oh, I'm getting slow?" Jetrak responded, smirking at him as they exited the stone practice area of the temporary Brotherhood of Unity base. "I suppose that the sun's getting cold, too."

"I suppose you're right. You aren't any slower. You always were that slow."

"And, ironically, you're the one that—"

"Commanders," said a Toa of Aura, who jumped in front of them, breathing heavily, as if he had been running for a long time. "Come quickly. I think there's something you should see."

Not asking any questions, Jetrak and Chameleo nodded at one another. "What is it?" said Chameleo.

"A spaceship," the Toa answered. "It crashed over the Sea of Life. We expect Brotherhood of Fear involvement, sirs."

"Those traitors!" Jetrak muttered under his breath. "Why is it so important to the two of us specifically?"

"Not you," said the Toa of Aura, shaking his head. "Him."

"Me?" Chameleo responded.

"They want you on the scene, sir," the Toa said. "I don't know why, sir, but it sounded pretty urgent. Oh, and it had something to do with a Leviathos. Do you know what a Leviathos is, sir?"

"Who doesn't?" Chameleo answered. "Where was it?"

"I'll transmit the coordinates immediately to your spacecraft, sir," said the Toa.

As Chameleo and Jetrak ran off, the Toa stood for a moment to watch them, his arms crossed, tapping one finger repeatedly on his elbow as if he were terribly bored. Then, with speed unmatched except by a Kakama user, he simply vanished on the spot, headed for another place.

The Toa of Aura knew exactly what he was doing as he raced through the base at the speed of sound. He passed by numerous beings, chatting and planning and living their lives, but none of them saw the phantom within their walls. Not even the new sensor equipment, which was just as advanced as it had been in the old fortress, could detect him.

He was not a Toa of Aura. He was, however, a Toa — or at least that was what he had once been. He no longer knew what he was. A Makuta? A Toa? No, he could not be either of those. He was darker and more powerful than any Makuta alive, and he had diverged so far from the path of light that he could certainly not be called a Toa. There remained no light left for him; had it been a weaker-minded being inhabiting that body, he would have been so despairing at the thought of life as this being that he might have ceased to live.

But Nightwatcher was by no means a weaker-minded being.

Why was he here? Why was he, once again, in the Brotherhood of Unity's fortress? The same reason he had been last time — answers. But last time, it had been answers of different sorts. Last time, he had wanted to learn from Leviathos the knowledge of the Elder Prophecies.

Now, he wished to use the knowledge of the Elder Prophecies to find a way to kill Leviathos.

For a month now, while the Brotherhood of Fear rose to power again on Noctxia Magna, while Makuta Teridax awoke in the body of the Great Spirit robot on the planet of Aqua Magna, while the Enforcers helped piece together once more the society on Gigas Magna, Nightwatcher had been searching for answers. He had encountered his mirror self, he had found a new companion, but none of his travels had yielded any answers — only more questions.

But now he thought he knew the answers to at least a few of them.

There was a prophecy, he had learned during his last encounter with the Noctian. There was a prophecy that told that one day, a half-Makuta, born in darkness and faced with great trial, would acquire power great enough to destroy the Makuta. The prophecy, however, could have applied to either Leviathos or himself. He had attempted to kill Leviathos, so that the prophecy would be about him, but Fate had intervened; Leviathos had managed to call upon the power of Space-Time.

So now, Leviathos had a power that he did not, and if he went against the Noctian again, he might lose. So he had to find a way to defeat him.

The prophecy had now become his sole reason for existing. If he had enough power to defeat his sworn foe, Makuta Matata, then he could be free...

Free forever...

Free at last...

But first, Leviathos must die. And when Nightwatcher stopped moving a second later, when he saw the place that awaited him beneath the surface of Noctxia Magna, beneath the Brotherhood of Unity's base, when he saw the absolute power that he could possess...

He smiled.

Chapter 3
A hologram of Kaluu flickered to life in the midst of darkness. The glow illuminated the face of Krakanus.

"I fear they suspect us for Neocrax's actions. We must end this soon. You must finish the plan."

"Keep you voice hushed, Kaluu," snapped the great Makuta. "What do you suggest we do, then? Need I remind you of the importance of this mission?"

"We use him," replied Kaluu, a trace of fear showing in his projected face.

"I don't see how..." Krakanus started, until he noticed Kaluu's eyes narrow angrily; however, Krakanus observed there was still that trace of fear and of another emotion. But what? Krakanus wondered. ''Shame? Pity? Sorrow?'' No, it it was regret.

"You can't be serious?" said Krakanus realizing what Kaluu had implied.

"I know you are fond of him, but this plan is worth more than his life," said Kaluu. A harsh tone was starting to develop.

"This is just because you want his position. You do not offer yourself up for this."

"That is because he is weak. Even I, at least, came close to defeating the Noctian. He has failed every time, and does not even posses proper armor!" yelled Kaluu.

The doors slammed open, but Krakanus managed to slip in one final comment of "Fine" before killing the projection. Two Order of Mata Nui agents walked in, followed by a Noctxia Guardian, all of them senior officers.

"We heard screaming," said the first one. "Is everything alright?" He raised his weapon to Krakanus's head.

"Yes" said Krakanus, his eyes shifting from the men to their weapons.

"Really? Because we heard what sounded like Kaluu. But he's out of comm range... or is he?" Now all the guards aimed their weapons at the Makuta.

"Look, everything will be..." Just then, Krakanus whipped up a storm of plasma, burning all the guards to death. He stepped over their ashes to see a lone being running away.

"Traitor!" he screamed. "I'll tell the others about what you did!" However, in a flash of shadow, Krakanus hit him dead in the chest with a shadow Cordak. His body exploded into flaming pieces.

"Yes. You'll have plenty of time to tell them all about what I did tomorrow, when they will all join you."

For the hundredth time in Chameleo's memory, the purple void blurred away, light seeping into the corners of his eyes, then filling his entire vision as he dropped from the dimensional void into reality.

He looked through the main viewport of his new spacecraft towards the beautiful twilight of Noctxia Magna, then diverted his gaze to what lay below him. He stopped his forward motion, hovering in the air like a moth, and then the spacecraft silently lowered itself through the shining blue sky onto the small island in the Sea of Life. There was no irritating roar of thruster engines or primitive jet technology; their new allies, the Enforcers of Gigas Magna, had shown the Brotherhood how to move spacecraft with magnetism, calling upon planets' magnetospheres to aid them. Chameleo did not fully understand the technology, and it did not work outside the range of planets' magnetic fields, but he liked it quite a bit.

The island below him was normal for an island on Noctxia Magna: relatively small, but filled with plant and animal life in all its forms. A forest lay to the east, while the west was mostly a lush prairie. As the ship came closer to its destination, Chameleo spotted a dark spot that contrasted sharply with the rest of the prairie, which he could not fullt make out but he guessed was the spaceship that the Toa had told him about.

His ship landed a few seconds later, settling smoothly on the grass without much impact. He opened the top door and with his powerful legs, neatly jumped out of the ship without the assistance of the ladder that hung at his side. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Jetrak's ship landing nearby, but his attention was fixated on the starship wreck that lay in front of him.

It was not a pretty wreck. After one moment, Chameleo decided that the reason for that was not entirely the fault of the crash that had smashed it open and split it in two large fragments, but instead the fault of the designer; he could guess, judging from the charred remains, that it had not been designed for visual appeal. It was probably a prototype ship, and one glance at the engines told him as much. It was a primitive form of technology that had not been used on Noctxia Magna, so far as he had understood from his time there, for a few hundred years, which probably meant that the civilization that had built it had only just learned the secrets of interplanetary travel.

And then he saw the markings on the spacecraft, barely discernible, but which had not been fully marred by the travel through the atmosphere. They were ones that he knew well; he had rushed into battle with the Order of Darkness with those markings on a flag carried by some being near him more than once, and every time he had come to Daxia, he had seen those. Those markings were burned into his brain.

It was the symbol of the Order of Mata Nui.

So the Order has finally learned how to make starships, he mused. ''Apparently, they aren't able to use an Olmak to teleport everyone anymore. So why did this thing crash?''

He stepped closer to the wreckage and laid his hand on one of the larger remaining chunks of the space cruiser. It was still warm, but not searing, which probably meant that the ship crashed not so long ago. He ran his fingers over the Order symbol for a moment, then stepped towards another of the fragments.

This one had a large, circular hole nearly cut from it. For a moment, he thought it had been cut by the rescue team that no doubt had already arrived, but then he saw the burn marks on the inside edges of the hole, and he realized that the hole had been made before it had crashed. But that made no sense; why expose the crew to explosive decompression?

For that matter, why was the spaceship here in the first place? This planet was only known to the Brotherhood of Unity and the Enforcers of Gigas Magna. Perhaps the Order had sent a supply convoy to the planet, with supplies that could not simply be teleported, for some reason or another... But as Chameleo looked over the wreckage a little longer, he saw no evidence of any supplies whatsoever.

So the only obvious reason was that there was another stop for the ship to make. Perhaps it only intended to drop something off and then return to the Order. But for whatever reason, it had never dropped anything off. He remembered what the Toa of Aura had said about Brotherhood of Fear involvement, but how could they have found out that the Brotherhood was involved?

He looked toward where he assumed Jetrak was, wondering if the Toa of Plasma knew something he didn't, but

Trivia

 * The Toa of Aura that Nightwatcher disguises himself as in Chapter 2 is the same one that appears in The Leviathos Chronicles.