Rowdy Dead Productions

By David C. Daoust

Craiden was buried in the darkness, he couldn’t think. He saw the light finally break the shadows, but he wasn’t himself. He was a scared trapped animal, frothing at the mouth; a scared trapped animal that was suddenly released. He tore into the silhouette of a figure that appeared first. The fact that his fists struck metal, did not give him pause. He thrust his elbow under the chin, and threw all his weight into the figure, forcing them both through the new opening, and into the light. Finally he had found the surface, the open sky above.

Broken and bleeding the berserk warrior barely scanned the surroundings before more of the droids approached. Their soft strange voices, that tried to sooth him, did not register in his mind. He hurled himself from the wreckage of the starship, a mad dash for freedom; he had been trapped within for so long.

A medical droid caught him, mid air. Craiden found himself in the middle of two metal torsos, he barely kept his footing, as the soft voices tried to reason with him. The madness of the berserker rage had taken him though, and he thrashed again as he wrapped his arm around the closest droids neck. His heightened strength allowed him to twist and wrench the thing till it went flying off. He suddenly leapt from one end of the stretcher like vehicle to the other. He gripped the next droids neck in the same way. This time the vehicle went flying high up into the air, spinning out control, as the berserk managed to pin the metal head under his arm.

With no care whatsoever to his own safety, the head suddenly shattered to bits under his torrent strength. Sending both man and vehicle crashing through the trees below. He was too enraged to even realize that he should have died at such a height. The faint blue light that appeared momentarily in his eyes, then flashed through his veins- went unnoticed to the maddened beast. The fact that he slowed through the air, and even halted a few feet over the ground, before he was released to fall into a heap on the ground, did not register either as he leapt back to his feet.

Instinct took over; the blood and bruises, and possibly broken bones, completely ignored in his current state. He fled like a wounded animal into the densest grouping of trees and wild growth he could find.

Once well within he found a tree to support his back as he slid to a seated position. The pain threatened to return. His mind began to churn through thoughts, as his senses still focused on the world around him. He needed to think, but the pain of his injuries might leave him useless.

He pictured his family; His mother, his father. The First Wave, while rejecting government and authority alike, were not without their own principles. His mother had taught him ‘the Freedom and the Way’. This was a ‘Decalogue of Guiding Principles’. He had no idea why his mind focused on this, everything else was just stripped away. The pain was numb but it was returning as the pain receptors in his brain were slowly turned back on.

His mother had told him that his Great Grandfather, Craiden Swan , had taught her these principles. She said that he had translated them himself, he claimed it was in such a way, that even an atheist could benefit from them. She’d pointedly elaborated several times that his words were specifically, ‘Even an idiot atheist could benefit from them!’ which said more of the man, than the principles.

Suddenly a shadow appeared above, blocking out what meager light shown through the canopy of leaves above. The great metal head of Plaguecat appeared above him. At the sight of the giant metal dragon, Craiden’s mind threatened to descend back into that primal state; pain and fear tended to bring it on all the faster.

Craiden leapt to his feet, tried to fortify, not only his body for a possible battle against the mechanical dragon that now growled threateningly as they studied each other, but to fortify his mind from slipping back into the animalistic rage that had brought him here. He grasped for the list of principles; which he and his cousins had taken to calling ‘rules’ (much to his mother’s chagrin;’rule’ sounded to ‘commanding’ for the woman’s taste). The first five were known as ‘The Freedoms’. Currently, it was all he had to fend off his own descent into fear.

“Rule number one,” he struggled with the thought, trying to maintain his humanity, “Don’t fall for it, when someone pretends to be God.” He heard his mother’s voice explain that one should know what God sounds like… and those without a god, well, they should know what they know. It was about not being conned, or being trapped in servitude.

The dragon pressed forward, slowly, its head wavering slowly, hypnotically, while its body was held low to the ground, it prowled like a cat about to pounce, all of which made the hairs at the back of Craiden’s neck stand up. Craiden’s body tensed, but his mind fought back the urge to slip into the beast like state that beckoned him. And so he focused on rule number two.

“Rule number two,” he muttered aloud through the growing pain and ebbing madness, “Don’t pretend to be God.” A rule which was more than just not conning people, but not convincing oneself they had abilities they did not, or could not. It had so many more aspects to it though, You are not a god- you cannot see into another mind; It is okay to be human, to fail- stand up, move on.

The dragon pressed forward, snapped its teeth. It let a gush of hot air vent through his barred teeth, threatening the fire that lay within. Craiden lost ground.

“Rule number three,” he began, the principle itself, as his Great Grandfather had written it, was ‘Don’t wistfully wish and pray for things within your ability to achieve, especially that which is only requested as proof of a higher power’ but that was too long for his present mindset, so he only muttered his own simplified version of it, “Don’t pray.” His mother had always argued that this version was too simplified.

He found himself suddenly backing away from the metal dragon as it pushed its head closer and closer. The fear threatened to take over, and with it the berserker rage. If that happened, he was sure his mind would slip back into madness, back into a state that was sure to drive him into a furious attack- From there he could only foresee death.

“Rule number four,” he continued the task he had given himself, as he braced himself- unwilling to lose anymore ground, physically or mentally, “Learn from the past.” His mother said this was her grandfather’s favorite. She claimed she could still hear his voice, quoting from his studies within the Royal Archives, proclaiming ‘For those who fail to learn from history, are doomed to repeat it’.

“Rule number five,” he took a step forward, the dragon growled, “Honor your ancestry.”

This put Craiden in mind of his father’s own saying, ‘A little bit of chaos goes a long way’. The fear slipped away with the thought, and a little smirk appeared on his face. He found himself emboldened. This was not the first time Craiden had forsaken the final five principles known as ‘the Way’ for his father’s own rough shot version of a ‘life rule’. (For example, when he’d ordered that drone raid on Grady)

The speed of the dragon head as it suddenly lunged at him, snapping its massive jaw, pushed Craiden into action. He balled both his fists together and bashed the great metal head away. The pain was enough to sear through his arms and shoulders, all the way to his ribs. His mind threatened to slip, but he held tight. He let the chaos come, and he went with it again and again.

Craiden Haul took the pain of the blows he received from the dragon, and the pain from those he delivered, all the while holding onto that long lost memory, of a father lost… what felt like eons ago. He did not know where the power came from, but he was strengthened; he could swear he saw the light itself course through his veins. He held on to his ancestry, honored it to his best ability, and the beast within was unable to take control.