The Secret of Tanencha sy Tyrin

6 | Off to Space

Stella raised her hands to the sky, as a white force swirled around her. Just seconds ago, the Tanencha had told her she would be returning to the real world, and now, she was being transported there.

She shut her eyes tight, and squeezed her fingers together, as the energy swirled around her, enveloping her body until one loud popping noise stopped it all. For a moment, she only saw white. It wasn't a calming white though, it was a bright white, almost as if she was staring directly at a star. Blinking several times, Stella turned around, and suddenly, everything went black. It was the cosmos, filled with stars.

Little white, yellow, and red dots littered the sky, as Stella turned around. It felt like she was floating, hovering around the area. She let herself smile, just a little bit, as she scanned the beautiful sky, remembering all the memories made there. Stella had forever loved space travel. Whenever she was in the sky, just her ship and her, she always experienced the most amazing sensations.

The night sky was always beautiful, but it appealed to her, even more, when she experienced on her own. Stella remembered docking at random planets and camping there for the night, just to look at the stars. When she wasn't on missions, she always liked to explore the universe- as far as her clunky old ship could take her.

Continuing to examine the sky, she noticed the little dots- stars, coming closer together, forming on a big sphere of light- a large star that was right in front of her. She braced for the immense heat, knowing that if in the real world, she would never be able to survive this. The large star became bigger and bigger until it consumed her, causing Stella to disappear in a flash of light.

And then, she was opening her eyes, and wiggling her toes. The world around her was dark, and she had to adjust to the light. She looked around, finding she was flat on her back, next to the very ground she'd stood on when she was first transported to the realm she'd been in. How long had it been since she was in the real world?

It felt like days, perhaps even months. But as her eyes scanned the territory around her, it seemed almost nothing had changed. And then, she recalled what the Tanencha had told her a while ago, about how time passed differently in the void.

She groaned and picked herself up from the ground, wondering how she got herself into this situation. The Tanencha had said the ships didn't exist but it couldn't hurt to check...

"Stella," The Tanencha's voice interrupting her thoughts. She mentally slapped her head, remembering it always knew what she was thinking, "Focus. To defeat Azarath, we must find where he resides." It continued, "So I'd like you to scan your memories. It is somewhere among them."

Closing her eyes, Stella tried to picture what his lair would look like. Probably dark, and gloomy, she deduced. But this wasn't getting her anywhere. "I don't know where Azarath's lair is. I've never been there, why would it be in my memories?" She prodded.

"Because," The Tanencha said simply, "You have the memory of all Tyrin's before you. One of them has attempted and failed to retrieve the crystal."

Stella gritted her teeth, trying to hold back the harsh words stuck in her head. She then remembered, of course, the Tanencha knew what she was thinking, and there was no need to. "Well, some instruction would be nice, I can't just pull this up from nowhere." She said seriously.

The Tanencha was silent for a moment, "Do what you did before," It told her, "But instead of focusing the energy in front of you, focus on it within you."

Stella nodded and complied. Although she wasn't confident this would work in the real world, it was worth a try. Doing the same thing as before would be easy- she'd learned it well, and could do it quickly now. The tricky part about this was focusing that force within her, as opposed to in front of her. But if she could utilize it before, that probably meant there was no difference.

The Tanencha stayed silent as she focused, and brought forth a power. It felt like her mind was scanning and reliving information she didn't own. But she supposed she did. It was within her, more or less around her, so in theory, that meant it was hers.

Stella gasped as an image- one of a darkened cave, with lights piercing into it, came over her mind. The image minimized, showing her the directions, it seemed. As the image disappeared from existence, she gasped once more, and then swallowed.

"Was that...?" Her speech trailed off, unsure of what to say.

The Tanencha swiftly answered, "Yes, it was." It said, "And now, you must return to your ship, and travel there. It is your duty."

Stella cocked her head to the side. "My duty?" She said, and then smacked herself in the forehead. "Oh right, that." She said, flinching at how stupid she sounded. "How do I get out of this place anyway?"

"The same way you came in."

Right, the lights. Those had guided her here. It would quite nice if those lights could reappear sometime soon. Instead of honoring her wishes, the area stayed dark, forcing Stella to blindly walk through the caves, hands in front of her. She felt the rough walls against the palms of her hands, searching for a break in the solid path.

Once she found one, she walked forward, confidently. Seconds later, she slammed into a wall, one she hadn't seen before, and was forced to retreat. This obviously wasn't going to be easy. It could be another test- the Tanencha seeing if she was smart enough to escape.

Through her training, she had always used the energy the Tanencha had given her for power- to complete each task the Tanencha had told her. But when thinking about it, it took up an awful lot of energy- and radiated a lot of light. Perhaps she could use it to guide her. That seemed like a Plausible use of energy, and Stella smiled at who clever she was being.

So she did just as she had before, tens, maybe hundreds of times, and focused on the space in front of her, closing her eyes. And just as she had perfectly envisioned it, she pulled back and opened her eyes once more. In front of her, hovering just inches away from her chest, was the energy. It lit up the caves and allowed her to see a clear pathway.

As she walked, it followed her and soon enough, she made her way through the cave. Soon, she was the bright light coming from the outdoors and began to sprint over to it. It seemed like it had been years since she'd been there. But no matter how long it felt for Stella, it seemed that nothing had changed about the area.

Nearing the clearing where she had landed her ship, she saw that nothing had changed. It hadn't rusted over or anything. It simply lay in the same position, surrounded by the same flowers as before.

And those flowers, they were marvelous. Big, bright, bold, beautiful. Stella had forgotten about them. Through all of her training, she had forgotten what the actual planet had looked like.

But no time to dwell on that. Stella had to get into her ship and travel to Azarath's lair, wherever that was. The Tanencha had told her she knew where it was, but to be frank, she barely could remember it. Maybe some ridiculous intuition would come to her, like it did in the old stories.

She got into her ship- and looked around, making sure nothing had gone missing. Although this planet seemed virtually abandoned by humans or other humanoid species, she had to check. Her ship was one of her most valued positions- she'd purchased it at an old labor planet a while back, and had kept it safe ever since.

Before, when she was going out to do jobs, she would hitch a ride on another unsuspecting beings ship. Sometimes she'd hitchhike, and other times, she'd sneak on. But when she got the ship, she didn't have to do that. It took a lot of stress off of missions, especially ones like this one.

Even if the Tanencha had told her it wasn't real, that there weren't ships for her to collect and distribute, she still classified this as a mission. That's what this was, right? It seemed to blare obvious to her.

The only difference between this and a mission was that failure with this could cause death. And not just the death of her, but the death of plenty of people according to the Tanencha. During missions, if she failed, it was only her that would be affected. But if she failed this one, this entire planet- possibly this galaxy would perish.

And Stella didn't want that guilt on her shoulders, even in death.