“I vaguely remember a time when the planet singed for me, vibrantly, with a pure unbridled tone but that was a very very long time ago, now when I tread on the planet, it sing for no one. It does not hate me, it fears me. Rightfully so.” - Yaga

Rezalas stood behind the bar counter cleaning glassware, the work distracting him from his troubles. The last few weeks had been horrible, each one terrible in its unique own way, soon he would have to leave, go somewhere less lively.

He heard a knock, not on the door but on the counter, he looked up abruptly and before him sat a man, he wore a suit that was completely black, and glasses covered his red eyes. He had an air to him, it made people relax in his presence but Rezalas knew him too well to be affected by such things. 

Rezalas had hoped that the man wouldn’t come visit him but that was foolish. The man had no name, well he did have a name but it wasn’t his own, he stole it from someone close to him, his mentor.

His people didn’t have names yet his mentor did. Rezalas always found this strange but he never asked questions about such things. 

The man called himself Fon and he had many enemies to say the least.  Enemies capable of shattering entire planets, which is why Rezalas tried his best to keep his distance from Fon. 

Rezalas glanced at Fon and went to work, mixing a beverage for him. 

“Rez, how have your days been recently, old friend?” Fon spoke casually for someone who had so many swords to watch out for.

“Terrible, things have started to heat up since you landed here. The very land you tread despises you, I always wondered how one can make literal planets hate them.” Rezalas said quietly, the revelry in the bar should have made it hard to hear him but Fon seemed to understand him just fine.

Fon smiled, “Their hatred for me was instilled in them from a very early stage, I've only ever made one planet hate me and… it was the nicest one out of all of them.”

“You do seem to have a talent when it comes to angering things,” Rezalas said, “but I suppose that is unavoidable for someone like you.”

Fon ignored his comment, “Tell me Rez,” he said, “is Zalria here? I grow annoyed at having to chase him.” Fon sighed, “I find it funny that he hides in places where I can find him instead of the one place that would keep me from him.”

“He hides from that place and you. Fon you must already know that Zalria has told me to say nothing.” 

Rezalas didn’t want to keep information from Fon but he couldn’t reveal information about Zalria. He was truly caught up between two tides, both equally dangerous in their own way.

All he could do was trust in Zalria’s words but could he really trust someone who broke the most important oath he’d ever made?

Fon chuckled, “He told you to say nothing… tell me why you think i can’t just take that information?” 

“Because it would make things too boring… that's what Zalria told me at least.”

Zalria had promised that no harm would come to Rezalas, he’d promised that Fon wouldn’t force him to do anything. He chose to trust those words because Zalria knew Fon better than most people.

“He's not wrong but things are getting urgent… why is it that he runs from home, why is it that he runs from his own world. He runs from the place that could protect me from him in order to go to these different worlds, worlds where his soul doesn’t belong, planets that aren’t as passionate as his.”

“He fears his home world more than you… he fears what it gives him since he can no longer hold it.” Rezalas said solemnly. His other self had told him of what Zalria carried and what a terrible thing it was.

“And that would be?” Fon asked

“Responsibility…” 

Fon’s eyes constricted for a moment. That was probably not the answer he expected, Rezalas thought to himself.

“A truly terrible thing to carry…many men can’t carry it, the greatest man I ever knew couldn’t so I shouldn't expect Zalria to do the same… but he must for a few years before someone new is available.” Fon said. 

He actually understood what Rezalas spoke of and this caught Rezalas off guard. Rezalas was expecting him to be dismissive like most but he wasn’t, in fact he understood, Rezalas shouldn’t have been surprised, after all Fon had lived for a very long time and he knew many things better than most but it was hard to keep this in mind sometimes. Fon acted young and looked young but he simply wasn’t.

Fon stood up about to leave but Rezalas found himself blurting out a question. This was probably his own way of buying Zalria time because destiny was coming and he couldn’t run away from it this time. 

“Why is it that you can’t visit E-Rimbo?” 

E-Rimbo was Zalria’s home planet and it was also Rezalas’s home planet but the planet he currently resided on was also his home planet, all planets were technically his home planet. Rezalas was still getting used to that. 

Fon paused for a moment before sitting back down, he probably saw through the ruse but he liked telling stories and he hadn’t told one in a very long time.

“A long time ago, before the first fire king, I stumbled upon a planet, it was unlike anything I'd ever seen. For you see the planet singed, not the same song but different songs, and it never repeated a song. The people that lived on that planet could not hear its songs unless they focused really hard but I could vividly hear the songs without much effort. The people would dance to the tunes of the planet on special occasions. You would think that I would grow annoyed at having to listen to songs every second but I did not for the planet sung the perfect song each moment. When I was angry, the planet sang a tune of pure fury and when I was happy it sang a joyful tune. When I was sleepy, it sang a lullaby for me. For many years I lived on that planet, enjoying the songs with all of the people who resided there. Eventually the time to leave arrived, and I left but I would one day return. 

I traveled to a different planet, nowadays it's known as death of the gods and I experienced much trouble for the seven years i lived there but it was nothing serious. In due time I returned to E-Rimbo and I was greeted with its songs that soothed my soul. My interest in the planet increased and I wanted to know why it sang. Many weeks passed, and using my own methods I found out that the planet was alive, which was strange that was the first time I found a planet that was alive and sentient. Eventually my curiosity brought me back to the people and I questioned them. I asked why the planet sang and how it managed to sing for each individual person. They told me the story of the first singer, the first human to ever visit E-Rimbo and how he sang in order to quench his loneliness, being the only human on the planet. 

The singer did not know that the planet was alive at the time. They say that he sang for a majority of his first ten years on the planet, strangely though in moments he did not sing, like when  hunting he heard his own songs sung to him. He figured that he was going insane but he had no way around it so he listened and enjoyed his own songs sung back to him, with a different voice, a beautiful voice that had a perfect pitch. Half a decade later and the man fully embraced his supposed madness, he would sing different songs each day and hear them repeated to him the very next day except these songs were more perfect, with a perfect pitch. But on one particular day, once all his songs were repeated to him, he heard a voice. The planet talked to him, it requested him to teach it how to sing and how to create its own songs. That was the first and last time that the planet ever spoke. The man did as requested, he still didn’t believe that the planet was alive back then but he had nothing else to do and no one to talk to. 

It is said that teaching the planet was one of the most enjoyable moments of that man’s life. The man died three years later, many of the people believe that the planet talked to him because it knew that the man's time would come soon but others disagreed.”

Rezalas finished mixing a drink and gave it to Fon. He gladly took it before continuing with his story. Rezalas was familiar with parts of the story and he had questions but he did not disrupt because he knew that Fon disliked that very much.

“As you know I am a social creature and so I wanted to talk to the planet out of curiosity but after many years of trying I eventually quit and after some thinking, I couldn't control the self-deprecating comments that crept into my mind. I must’ve looked like a lunatic talking to thin air. Anyways soon i would have to leave the planet again, to go somewhere, a place i don't wish to talk about. 

When I returned to E-Rimbo though, I can tell you that I was grateful for its songs. This is the part where I skip some things. I don't like doing this but it's something I must do because these secrets are very important to me. Perhaps one day I'll tell you the full story but for now you must accept the story the way it is.

 Many years later while I was on ither worlds I experienced terrible things but I also learned a lot. Including the fact that E-Rimbo held a powerful song, infinite in both variety and length. This was a song it never sang, this i knew and i needed this song for my circumstances were dire. So I returned and like I have done for most of my life, I stole one of its songs, the most important song it had, a song made only for it, a song that it only sung to itself, the most important gift it was ever given. 

I took it and Ever since I've never been able to visit that planet because if I did I fear that I would experience something worse than death. I can feel it each time I come close to the planet, I can feel its hatred for me.”

“...do you regret stealing from E-Rimbo?” Rezalas asked out of curiosity.

“I can tell you that I feel no remorse for what I did if that's what you're asking.” Fon said.  he never lied about such things.

“Did you really have to steal that song? I never thought that your enemies would make you that desperate.”

“I didn’t steal that song to protect me from my enemies. It was to protect myself from my own madness… existence is a terrible thing Rez, humans were not made to withstand it for as long as i have.”

Rezalas simply nodded, understanding what Fon spoke of but not completely comprehending everything. He had questions but he did not uttet them because he knew that Fon was leaving now and questions would be ignored.

Fon finished his drink before standing up and leaving. Some of Rezalas’s memories disappeared with Fon’s departure, Fon had stolen them, he could do that and rezalas knew that his memories were taken. He could not remember Fon’s appearance, he couldn’t remember the simplest details about him but he did remember that he’d met him and he remembered some of the things they talked about but some parts were missing. It would’ve been strange to have memories with gaps but Rezalas had experienced this many times before. 

Fon walked on the streets littered with people, their appearance somewhat strange to him. He’d seen many different kinds of races when he traveled around the universe but the people here were very unique. Fon had a premonition that he’d have to return here in the future once he’d returned Zalria to E-Rimbo, there was something here on this planet, a kind of mystery that he needed to solve, perhaps it could benefit him, help him accomplish his goal that he’d been trying to achieve for many years.

Fon frowned, my storytelling has gotten worse, but I suppose that's what happens when you don’t do something for a long time. I could’ve still done better, perhaps not skip parts, maybe replace those parts with lies that would still convey the message… No one likes stories with gaps. Fon had a sudden urge to back and retell his story, he could simply steal Rezalas memories of the story and retell it but Fon forced these thoughts to the back of his mind. He had more important matters to attend to, perhaps he could go visit Rezalas again after.

Fon swiped his hand. with that motion came a sword, seemingly appearing out of thin air. The people simply ignored Fon as if he wasn’t there. The sword was thin and was mostly colored blue. It was ornamented with hieroglyphs, they made it look more like a ceremonial sword. Fon had done that on purpose mostly to annoy the sword,  the voice of the sword. The sword didn’t like him very much for that because it wanted to look simple, to look like a real weapon of war, it sometimes cursed at him for what he did but Fon didn’t mind. One would think that it would be thankful for being saved from the hands of death but it wasn’t, Fon was beginning to understand that the way people thought and the way swords thought were completely different. Stealing things from death was very dangerous but he’d worry about that later. Right now it was time to return this sword to its master. Rezalas had said that just telling him where Zalria is was boring and he was right. Fon sighed, I guess I'll have to do something even more boring, it's time to cheat. 

Fon’s glasses seemed to dim for a moment before lights started flashing in them, these lights created patterns that looked like some kind of complex code. This code seemed to contain infinite knowledge that fon’s eyes deciphered. He smiled and with sword in hand Fon mysteriously disappeared.