Dododex

ARK: Survival Evolved & Ascended Companion

The Omega Timeline Chapter 30: What Happened at The Dark Obelisk

Once all four of them were on the plane and Andrew refilled the fuel, Erica started firing up, she was nervous doing this. This was her first time flying a plane, she had done a couple simulators when she was still in college but never flown before. Sylas was humming an old tune and muttering something about a danger zone as the engines came to life. Erica quickly did a preliminary check on things before looking back at everyone and then looking at Sylas on her right.

“Everyone ready for this?” Erica asked,

“Yes!” Ruby said

“Ready!” Neddy said

“Let’s do this!!” Sylas said excitedly. Erica pressed some buttons and flipped some switches and the jet began to hover off the ground.

“Alright, launch in tee minus 5, 4, 3, 2-”

“Punch it Chewie!!!!” Sylas shouted.

“1” The plane flew fast out of the hanger and into the blue sky.

As they reached a certain altitude, Erica could hear Ruby and Neddy whispering and giggling in the back, she looked over her shoulder and saw they weren’t talking like they were suspicious or talking bad on someone but rather in a smitten with each other way. She noticed Neddy’s implant was glowing and was wondering why it was doing that, but she wasn’t really concerned about it. She smirked and looked back the sky ahead.

‘These two don’t seem too bad. It doesn’t mean I trust them though. But I can probably ease on them compared.’ She thought to herself. ‘These two do seem rather adorable together.’, she reached her right hand across and itched her left hand. She came out of her heard Sylas unstrapped himself and looked over and Erica.

“Here, let me fly.” Sylas said, Erica raised an eyebrow at him.

“You’ve flown a jet before?” Erica asked suspiciously.

“Yeah I’ve flown a private jet… once… and I almost killed everyone.” Sylas said as he scratched the back his head. This answered Erica’s suspicions.

“Then I’m probably not going to let you fly this Sylas. We’ve got passengers that don’t want to die.” Erica said, they sat there in silence for a moment

“So, you’ve flown a plane before?” Sylas asked

“No but I’ve-” “You have no experience flying yet you won’t let me fly?” Sylas said in a whispering whine.

“I do have more experience than you, but I’ve never flown a plane before. But I flown many advanced flight simulators before so this isn’t hard for me to do.” Erica retorted. She looked over at Sylas who was sulking a bit and she rolled her eyes.

“Look, we each have skills the others aren’t good at. Yours is computer sciences, Andrew’s a survival expert, Freya’s a combat expert and I know a lot about the Arks and if needed I can fly a plane. We all have are skilled at important things.” Erica said, however Sylas stayed quiet.

‘This is going to be a long, flight.’

But to Erica’s surprise, the flight was short. Less than an hour to arrive. Erica landed only a little distance away from the obelisk. She noticed that it was pretty dark and assumed it was getting late. The plane landing was slightly rough. But with no on board casualties or any damage done to the plane so it was a success. Sylas was annoyed with her for not letting him fly the plane and gave her a huff. Erica just rolled her eyes. He was as bad as a six year old when he was sulking.

“Alright, let’s unbuckle and see what this Obelisk has to say about itself.” Erica said, everyone began unbuckling their seatbelts and getting whatever they needed for their soon encounter. When they finally had everything that they thought they could need, they exited the plane. The area was a wasteland, not much different to the wasteland of Earth. However something was different, flickering lights similar to glitches appeared and disappeared almost like lightning strikes would. A low, black, ominous fog hung over the entire area blocking out most of the sunlight.

“Well, if this doesn’t give you villain vibes, I don’t know what does. Let’s go back to the mansion.” Sylas said walking back into the jet. Erica turned back to him and grabbed the neck of his shirt.

“Oh no you’re not. We got to see if we can stop whatever’s happening here.” Erica said,

“Well there’s someone here, or at least nearby.” Neddy said looking down at his implant as it glowed.

“You think it’s Ember and Drain?” Ruby asked,

“See, this place is like a real no no Erica. We should leave like now.” Sylas said, beginning to try to pull himself away from Erica. But she was stronger than he was and wasn’t going to let go.

“It still doesn’t change the fact that we need to stop this obelisk from doing its mind tampering. We need to at least see how it’s doing that. And besides, we outnumber them, I doubt they’ll mess with us.” Erica said as she started walking with Sylas in hand, Ruby and Neddy both looked at each other and shrugged before heading off with them. However, Ruby and Neddy noticed something as they walked away from the jet. Neddy’s implant began fading as they got further and further away from the jet. Neddy looked up and was about to say something to Erica and Sylas, but they were talking about the obelisk. Neddy looked at Ruby for a moment.

“So does that mean that they left or we’re walking away from someone?” Neddy asked,

“Do you think someone stowed away on the plane? I don’t see any hiding places here.” Ruby asked.

“I don’t know, the fog is pretty thick, and who would’ve tried coming here? Samuel? Aurora? One of them? Let’s just ignore it for right now and catch up to those two.” Neddy said and Ruby nodded in agreement. And they ran off, as they did. They heard Sylas scream and Erica trying to quiet him down.

“Quiet down, do you want Drain and Ember to know we’re here!” Erica whispered loudly,

“Maybe, yeah!! Maybe they should know I can very well wipe us all out to kingdom come by mistyping the wrong key in!!” Sylas shouted in a whispering tone.

“What’s going on?” Neddy asked,

“Nothings going on, Sylas is overreacting.” Erica said

“You told him, didn’t you?” Ruby asked

“What? You knew?! Erica!! You told her this before telling me?!” Sylas screeched quietly.

“Yeah, she knew. I told her you were being too cocky and needed a reality check. Now let’s get moving.” Erica said with irritation.

“Can someone please explain what this was about?” Neddy asked in a confused state.

“I’ll tell you on the way.” Ruby said.

The four walked cautiously as they were entering a small crag that shielded the terminal . Ruby was explaining what Erica told her earlier about Sylas. Sylas was as pale as a ghost. Erica knew what she had to do, even though she would hate it.

“Sylas, you’ll do fine. You just have… to…” Erica stopped what she was saying as she noticed four silhouettes in the fog ahead.

“Erica, what we’re you-” “Shh” Erica quietly as she pointed ahead at the silhouettes. Everyone’s eyes widened. And they watched as a fifth person appeared from the terminal.

“ABSTRACTION COMPLETE ’THE RIDDLES OF THE PHOENIX SERIES’ CHARACTER, CAPTAIN SHORTSTACKS- ERM, CAPTAIN FRANCIS HUGO, ABSTRACTED.”

“What are we going to do?” Neddy asked, Erica looked around and noticed the loose rocks and then an idea formed.

“Ruby, can you make a couple longer pieces of tripwire? I have an idea.”

* * * *

“And why do I get the feeling you are all bad guys?” Neddy said, the five others looked at them with malicious smiles on there faces.

“Funny, we were thinking the same thing.”

“Allow me to introduce myself. I’m Milo. And your names are?” Milo said grinning, Erica and the others ignored this.

“So are you?” Erica said.

“Are we what?”

“Bad guys?”

“Oh that… no. You are.” Milo said,

“How are we the bad guys in this situation?” Erica said.

“Well you came to either stop us or this thing. In my eyes, that’s a bad guy.” Milo said smiling.

“But this place is messing with all of our minds!!” Erica said.

“Don’t really know, don’t care in the slightest. Now do you care to surrender or die?”

“Can I say something!” Sylas interjected, “My word that man is short,” he said getting off track as he pointed to the captain, Captain Shortstacks eyes began to fill with anger. “he’s even shorter than I am!!” Sylas said.

“You know, as a citizen you can be arrested and punished for making fun of a captain of the British navy.” Shortstacks commented, gritting his teeth.

“Yeah, well I’m not a British citizen.” Sylas said.

“Was that all you were going to say?” Milo said irritatedly,

“Oh right, no. What I was going to say is. If you want us, you have to catch us!! RUN FOR IT!!!” Sylas shouted and all four ran back down the path they came from.

“You four circle from the sides, I’ll take them from behind.” Milo said as he began running after them.

He chased them through the crag and began closing the gap on them, for some reason they slowed down for a moment and continued running afterwards. He continued closing the gap until he tripped on something and heard a loud thud. He stopped to look at what he tripped over only to see the rock walls collapse on top of him.

Erica and the others were still running, she looked behind her to see the rock walls tumbled down. She really hoped that whoever tripped the wire got out of the way of the rocks. But she wasn’t going to cry over it if they didn’t. These three she was with didn’t deserve death or punishment of torture. They all slowed down and stopped for a minute to look at the rubble that blocked the path behind them.

“Do you think that stopped them?” Neddy asked. Erica looked to her left and saw two coming from around the crag. And started running right at them

“Nope, we’re gonna have to split up. Don’t lead them to the plane. Neddy, you and Sylas go right, me and Ruby will go left.” Erica said

“You do realize that splitting up is the worst thing to do in any book or movie right?”

“Just do it Sylas!!” Erica yelled, and the four split up and went opposite directions. What they didn’t notice however was the rubble of rock beginning to move.

* * * *

Sylas and Neddy ran away from the other and the jet. He didn’t know why this was necessary to run away from the plane but he didn’t question it. They ran away until they heard a familiar roar. They stopped in their tracks and turned around to see a Reaper come from the crag pathway and started running straight towards Erica and Ruby. Neddy turned towards Sylas with fear.

“We have to do something right? We can’t let that kill them!!” Neddy said, his voice cracking as he said this. Sylas wanted to do something, but what could they do. He didn’t know, he just stood there not knowing what to do. Imagining possible scenarios and most, being the worst case scenario. Everything around him blocked out he thought of his ally, his friend dying. He thought of Neddy’s friend dying with her and neither of them being able to do anything.

“Sylas!!!”

Sylas snapped out a second to late as he felt a sharp pain pierce his leg and falling to his knees. The short man with the sword walked out from behind Sylas. He looked down on Sylas, even though it wasn’t much of an angle difference Sylas thought.

“Revolting rebel. Deserving of a a pirate’s punishment.” The man said, he turned to Neddy who was in a head lock by a half naked teen about the same age as him.

“Now then, for you. You will tell us everything you know or deal with my wrath.” The man said, Neddy said nothing. Sylas heard Neddy yell in pain as the man slashed his side, the guy holding Neddy in place gasped and looked at the man.

“Hey, that was way too close!!” The kid said,

“Oh shut up!!” The man said be said the same thing to Neddy who again didn’t answer. The man slashed his arms and this repeated several times, with each time the man sliced Neddy’s Arms and Legs and Neddy yelling out in pain. The man looked at him with fury.

“Give me an answer!”

“Enough! I’ll tell you, just stop hurting him.” Sylas said as he got up. His eyes were full of tears and anger.

“Fine, then tell me everything yo-” “Yeah, yeah, but before I do. I gotta say you look even shorter than I first saw you. You gotta be a dwarf or something. Do you like to eat coal instead of actual food?” Sylas said maliciously cutting of the man, this sent the man over the edge into a blind fury as the man went to stab into Sylas but Sylas dodged it and smiled as he did.

“Is that the best you got? Your both a lousy swordsman and a dwarf. Why don’t you just use an axe and play the part.” Sylas said and watched as his plan worked as the Brit got madder, he started swung his sword for his head and dodged it and then the Brit swung at his chest and again Sylas dodged it. Sylas thought it was time to make his move and knock this guy out and swung and punched the man in the face. The man staggered back and looked at Sylas with rage who have a face regretting all his choices.

“You hit like a toddler.” The man remarked before swinging his sword again. Which again Sylas swiftly dodged, only get a punched square in the face. He fell to the ground and looked up only to see the back end of the man’s sword come straight at him.

Captain Shortstacks looked down at the unconscious Sylas on the ground, and he raised his sword over him. This man hit every single nerve in this man’s body. And he lost it on this one punitive man.

“I don’t care what information he has, he’s dying right now!!”

“NOO!!” Neddy yelled as he shoved his way out of Lil Jack’s grip and ran towards him. Shortstacks turned around and aimed his sword at Neddy who stopped in his tracks. His eyes were red with rage and anger.

“Enough of these shenanigans!! Now, I am going to take you both to the mister Milo and I will plunge my sword into your friend in front of you and your friends and ask the same question I have been asking. Now Jack, please make sure to completely secure this man or so help me!!” Shortstacks bellowed.

* * * *

Erica and Ruby ran as fast as they could but the two behind them were catching up. Erica looked at Ruby who looked back at her. She looked frightened and scared. Suddenly a loud and familiar roar came from behind them. Erica looked behind to see a Reaper quickly approaching them. She looked next to them at a tree line. She knew one of them could use this as an escape while the other distracted and took the fall. She looked at Ruby, barely an adult and in love. Something she hadn’t felt in who knows how long, to her only a few months ago. But truthfully it was centuries ago for her. She knew what she had to do.

“Run in the trees and hide.” Erica yelled as they ran.

“What?”

But before she realized. Erica dead stopped. Ruby stopped and looked behind her.

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING!!” Ruby screamed.

“Go into the woods. One of us has to stay safe.” Erica said,

“That’s crazy, we ca-” “Just Go, NOW!!” Erica yelled, Ruby though didn’t seem like she was going to do it, she took a step forward then hesitated before running into the woods.

“Run Ruby!! Don’t let them find you!!” Erica yelled as the Reaper and the other two came and encircled her. The Reaper immediately pushed her over with ease and pinned her to the ground.

“Now do you have any last words before we kill you and your allies.” Milo spoke. Erica was stunned at first hearing it, she wasn’t expecting the man they talked to before to be a shapeshifter. This made her think that he was from wherever Queen Sylveevee came from.

“I don’t know, it doesn’t look like you have them anywhere?” Erica mocked, the Reaper got mad and looked to his left and then smiled and it made Erica concerned. “Why don’t you look to your right and see for yourself.” He said, she looked over to see Neddy walking over with the short man holding a sword to his back and a half naked kid dragging Sylas over to them. When they got close enough, Captain Shortstacks kicked Neddy down to his knees and Neddy looked at Erica.

“I’m sorry… I don’t know what happened to get us into this mess. But Sylas tried getting us out of it.” Neddy said,

“Quiet you!!” Shortstacks spat.

“Now, do you have any last words before you become a example to your allies?” Milo said grinning. Erica took a deep breath before looking back to the Reaper.

“Well, to tell you something your missing one, and if I’m going to die in front of my allies. I’ll be glad to tell them honestly. I’ll be glad to never come across your ugly, human face again.” Erica said, Milo sneered and readied his tail to stab her. She close her eyes, and thought for a moment as she prepared for death. Thinking about someone from her past, a very long time ago.