Empyrean Iris Story Collection Vol. 4

Vengeance is Mine

The argument ended there, and almost to his surprise Celex was dragged out of the room in the wake of Adam's protests. Oddly enough he sort of expected Adam might be able to talk Celex out of it, at least for the time being. He was usually very persuasive, but it seemed as if his luck had run out, and now was time to answer for his crimes.

He understood.

Celex kept his head high as they marched him through the ship and towards the docking bay. The Makers they passed all looked at him with an air of apprehension, and sometimes downright hatred. Many of them he didn't recognize, but a few of them he did. His memories of this place were sort of hazy, and in a way they almost didn't feel like his, but he could remember the trouble he caused, the way he had weakened the Maker's army.

In a way....

One might be able to argue that he started this whole mess, allowed the Void to gain more power than it should have, because the architect was busy fighting a battle on his own front. Did he experience shame for any of this?

Yes and no?

Celex by nature wasn't one to dwell on the past. He had done horrible things, he had hurt a lot of people, but unless there was some obvious means of making up for everything he had done, then there was no use crying about it. This, punishment, or whatever it was seemed as good a place to start, and he was more than willing to accept the consequences.

He wasn't going to sit and say sorry or beg for forgiveness because those things were meaningless, they wouldn't help anyone. What he cared about most was the person he had turned into, a complete 180 for the most part.

Turned out he just needed to be a part of something bigger, to have a purpose.

But punishment still only seemed fair.

As long as it didn't get in the way of kicking Apollyon's ass than it should be no problem, Right?

He was escorted off the ship, and onto a secondary shuttle from which Celex was able to judge the growing Armada that was beginning to form outside the Empyrean, It was a pretty impressive site, with ship by the thousands or maybe even the millions, it was hard to tell for sure, and behind all of that, a thousand planets and a thousand moons somehow managing to exist in the delicate gravity of the same burning star, all so familiar and all so distant.

They didn't head towards the Architect's planet, but warped rapidly towards the bottom of the star, where the planetary system was a little more sparse. And there they did not find another planet, but an artificial space station, locked into place at the base of the star. Looking at it, Celex could feel a sort of chill beginning to build inside of him,

He knew this place.

Gehenna

In some ways it reminded him of the orbital supermax space prisons popularized by humans, but much much worse. It didn't look like much, but that place was.... Well it was hell, hades, the abyss. He had seen people go in, but he had never seen the same people come out.

There was always a price to pay.

Their orbit took them closer, close enough to see the large white lettering written over the hull of the massive station, Big as a small planet : Gehenna Supermax:. Adam would have compared it to the death star if he were here. Celex knew the general layout of Gehenna, as big as a planet and nine levels deep on the inside. No one there had a lawyer, no one there needed one because everyone in that place deserved exactly what was coming to them.

No one in Gehenna was falsely accused.

Shuttles constantly came and went in a steady unbroken stream; a stream which they joined in due course, following the crowd steadily down and through a set of massive blast doors and into the docking bay. Following docking directions, their shuttle landed without so much as a delay, and the doors opened.

Six more security guards stood waiting for him as the door opened and he was escorted out and onto the waiting catwalk. Celex craned his neck back and up. The docking bay extended out of sight in both directions. Thousands of catwalks and sky bridges spidered over the room in a complex web. Other supplicants were slowly begging filed off their shuttles and down the catwalks towards intake.

Everyone comes back with sins.

But most people don't tend to commit the kind that deserves punishment in Gehenna. The average person can simply deal with their minor retribution during reorientation when they return from the construct world. It never takes more than a few minutes, and while a painful and unpleasant experience, it usually leaves the person feeling better, and ready to enter Maker society.

This place.... Was for people with much larger baggage.

Celex was ushered over the catwalk and down towards intake, which was a surprisingly rapid process.

The intake guard looked up as they approached and almost laughed, "Well slap my ass and call me a donkey, if it isn't incubus himself. Never thought I'd see the day, and never thought it would be me who had the pleasure of booking you in."

Celex frowned, "I go by Celex now."

"My apologies to your highness." The guard said with a snort, "Maker name not good enough for you?""

Celex shrugged, "You wouldn't believe my reasoning even if I told you."

"Yeah you're probably right." He pulled up a holographic clipboard and examine it with a continual look of glee that was making Celex want to reach out and deck him, "Yikes, my friend, you are in for one hell of a ride." He paused and then laughed, "One hell of a ride, get it."

Celex sighed, "You're comedic acumen knows no bounds."

The guard actually wiped a tear from his eye, "I know, now.... Uh there is a lot going on here, and I mean a lot. In fact if this was Santa's naughty list.... Well you would be ALL the names on that list,"

"You're metaphors are shit."

"Rude." The guard said, "Anyway here's how this works. Considering.... Your not so considerable history we have a couple of options. The longer you stay here, the easier your punishment will be, there will be time to rest, relax and reevaluate. Psychological counseling will be provided. You will be treated humanely and fairly..... Uh for you we have the million thousand or billion year sentence."

Celex almost choked, "What! I don't have a BILLION years, I don't even have the better part of an hour. Apollyon is coming and I need to help them get rid of it."
The guard laughed almost as if he thought something was incredibly funny.

"I mean we have faster options but."

"Thirty minutes, you have thirty minutes to get this over and done with."

The guard's eyes widened in wary shock, "Thirty minutes but, that's m-"

"Thirty minutes or no deal and I fight my way out of this place and show you all why everyone here keeps inching away from me."

The guard scratched his head, "I don't think you understand..... Thirty minutes, with the fear and pain of everyone you have ever caused harm..... It'll rip your soul apart. It's basically how the void harvests souls for energy, torturing them into pieces.... I can't authorize.,."

"Thirty minutes, or I start with you."

THe guard took a surprised step back, but then his eyes hardened, and he frowned, "Have it your way then..... Thirty minutes."

He was handed off to another group of guards, and ushered away further down into the labyrinth.

The guard couldn't help himself from shouting one last addition, "But don't blame me when you come out in pieces!"