Background

My name is Catherine West, I am a phoenix. My story begins in the middle, more or less, of the grand plot. I have been known by many names, have lived through many ages of this world and others. Technically, I was born during the Amarna Age of Ancient Egypt under the reign of pharaoh Akhenaten. When I was twenty three years old, a mother of three living children and wife to craftsman Tyi, a small child came to me in the market asking for help. I was known in the village as a healer, and this happened often so I thought nothing of it. He led me out of the village toward the reed marshes near the river. I heard a rustle behind me, and came awake some time later in a cave from a burning pain, blood seeping from a stab wound to my heart. A man was leaning over me, still holding the dagger that he’d just killed me with, it was still in the wound. “Awake phoenix, and arise, you are called to serve.”

After my first transformation, I was held bound in the cave by Arthur, the man who has killed and changed me every time since then. After I had calmed down and found a balance between reason and the sheer force of the power that was me, all the memories came rushing back. In order to define the need of my awakening, it is necessary to explain the politics of the world, the whole world. Each of the nine planets, yes Pluto still counts, is alive and populated, the reason no life has been found is because of the curtain walls that separate the worlds from one another. The curtain walls warp time and space, as well as the magic inherent in all life, thereby ensuring the safety of each world.

A long time ago, before the walls were erected, a great war broke out and destroyed almost all life on all the worlds, Pluto, in fact, was completely rendered devoid of all capability of supporting life; an entire planet and all the species on it, all life, was completely destroyed. It currently serves as a prison, for the more unruly and stubborn bad guys. A bastard son of one of the Kings joined a rebel force and with their help managed to forge an alliance with all the anti-war forces of the other worlds. This bastard son of a king was a half-breed, part fey and part elf, and therefore possessed of great magical ability, in fact he was the first phoenix. The Council, a fellowship of great wizards sought the rebels out and they set about planning a single, multiple-front attack on all the worlds, of such magnitude that the stunned worlds would recall their forces to face this new threat. A desperate gamble, but it worked. Once all the invading forces, or at least most of them, were returned home, the wizards and the rebel prince created the curtain walls, separating forever the worlds in a manner that would contain the malicious forces that could never be fully eradicated. The freedom-fighters took refuge in the wizard’s domain, a place outside of time and space, a place existing entirely within the realm of the Wild Magic, the same Wild Magic that is the curtain walls. Most of the freedom-army had elected to return to their home worlds, to help rebuild and go back to their lives, but a few chose to stay outside. These became the first Guardians.

The Guardians founded a small Kingdom of their own, ruled by a High King. Most of the people that live there, are civilians, innocents, and live more or less ordinary lives, though they live much closer to the magic than any other world. From among them, some are chosen at birth to become Guardians. Being chosen means that you are born with the gift of magic, the Wild Magic as part of your being, which allows you to cross the curtain walls and do some pretty interesting things besides. Since magic is still present in the other worlds, all except the world where Catherine West currently finds herself, it means that some who are also possessed of the Wild Magic and can therefore also cross the curtain walls are occasionally born, and often end up wreaking havoc and trying to bring down the walls in an attempt to dominate all life on all worlds. It is the sworn duty of the Guardians to prevent this from happening. The Guardians consist of the One, the Three, the Seven, and the Nine. The One is the High King, and he calls all the shots, is solely responsible for safeguarding the peace. The Three are the second most powerful Guardians, and consist of King’s Dragon, King’s Phoenix, and King’s Sphinx. The Seven are wizards, they oversee the upkeep of the curtain walls and generally keep an eye on all the worlds, keeping records of all that transpires and warn when a world-threatening event is about to occur. The Nine are the Knights, they are the ones sent into the worlds and see to the restoration of peace; they fight the bad guys and make sure they stop wreaking havoc. The Law of the Magic dictates that they don’t kill. What happens is that the magic they wield, allows them to ‘kill’ the bad guys in the home world, but it just transports them to Pluto. It is, however, possible for a Knight of the Nine to destroy an enemy, but for such an act, the consequences are severe.

This brings us to my particular situation. I was once the King’s Phoenix, second of the Three. There was an incident, and I was banished from court, they could not kill me and could not simply replace me, as there is only ever one phoenix in existence, only once the one is destroyed can another be born, and by definition I can be killed and reborn indefinitely, but can be destroyed completely, though only by destroying the jewel that is my heart. There have been several attempts to do so during my lives, but as yet none have managed to figure out how. The Guardians could not sentence me to death, could not keep me locked up on Pluto either, so instead banished me to the one world in which all traces of magic had been buried so deeply as to be inaccessible to any but those in whom the Wild Magic resides untarnished – born talent. I have lived many lives here, am awoken by Sir Arthur, Knight of the Nine, whenever there is need of my particular talents and sent back once the job is done. Usually that means Arthur kills me again, which resets the banishment and I am born again, oblivious, into the human world. 

Wakeup call

I ran all the way back to the not-a-basement room where I’d left my friends hours earlier, it was just before dawn on a Saturday morning. I opened the door, somehow expecting him to be there and as the door swings inward, we make eye contact, relief flooding me in a warm wave of comfort. “Hello Catherine, good to see you again”. His grey eyes are as clear and cold as I remembered. “Hello Arthur, I really wish we could meet under more auspicious circumstances in the future. I’m getting tired of the charade and Angel of Death doesn’t really suit your style”. He smiles, and beckons me inside and to a seat. “I take it they’ve initiated the transition, as per usual?” he sounds bored by the repetitiveness of it all, as I am. “Yes, I’m shot through the heart, and you’re to blame”. 

The banter is easy, but there’s a tension in the room that you could cut with a butter knife; suppose it’s to be expected, everyone’s staring at the bloodstain covering the left side of my shirt. I didn’t sit down, knowing what was coming, and took my shirt off instead, revealing a tank top and a gunshot wound where my heart used to be. Taking stock of the damage incurred during the chase, I’m partly surprised at the fact that I’m still standing...gunshot wound notwithstanding, my jeans were torn and bloody and my hands looked like they’d lost several fist fights. “I don’t feel any of it and I can remember most of the stories, so I suggest you finish the transition before sunrise. I’ve no particular wish to be caught in the breach”. My words were scarcely cold before he was standing in front of me with a beautiful, jewel-encrusted dagger, stabbing me through the heart without hesitation. The others gasp or cry out as I fall to my knees, dizzy with more than blood loss.  It must be quite a sight to see someone spontaneously combust, a friend on her knees being consumed by flames burning white-hot for less than a minute before nothing but a pile of ashes remain. 

Stunned silence reigns, and then suddenly the pile of ashes erupts into a fan of white light, the motes swirling upwards in a spiral, somehow coalescing into form. At first it’s only a vague outline, a silhouette of a person, then a shadow, until finally a girl of twenty three stands before them in place of the ashes. “Phoenix” Arthur whispers the name in awe; after all these years, the rebirth of a phoenix still takes his breath away. The phoenix, in human form, is a girl of five foot five, long midnight black hair, honey coloured skin and azure blue eyes. Combat boots, stretch black jeans and a black tank top, an overall improved version of the girl that had died in the fire of her soul, this girl looks almost just like the deceased, but with subtle, indefinable differences. “Arthur, give me my dagger please”. She holds out her hand to him and he places the dagger that had killed her hilt first in her palm. The jewel in the hilt was gone, no evidence of where it had been. The blade is made of watered steel, the hilt a twisted black with an eagle’s head on the end and its claws curling where the hilt meets blade, a thing of cold, purposeful beauty. Her hand closes around the hilt and she points the blade at her left arm, sliding the blade beneath it, and it disappears as if being sheathed. “Thank you, Arthur. Now, I suppose we owe them the grace of an explanation, don’t you think?” The voice is familiar, that of their departed friend, but there are undertones and inflections which make it sound hauntingly melodious and somehow alien. They all stare in stunned silence; no one has moved since the rebirth, until Ryan breaks the spell and says “What the hell just happened?” 

Earlier that day

It had started out like any other Friday; no dramatic drum roll, no ominous thunder clouds, nothing. Lisa and I went to our morning exercise, an all-girls program to keep housewives in shape, after which I had a shower and made my way to the office. I always picture myself as this corporate hotshot; skirt-suit and all. Instead, I ended up as a PhD student of Psychology, Research. I didn’t choose my topic, I went to the lecturer who specializes in Interpersonal Relationships when I was still applying for my Masters and asked to be on her team, and so ended up with a project on father-adolescent daughter relationships among low-income families. I’ve always been interested in the dynamics motivating human behaviour, especially human interaction, and hence ended up here. I have my own office in the psychology department of the university and am in charge of an undergraduate module on psych theories and works of fiction, aka Narrative Studies. Nothing particularly glamorous, but I enjoy it nonetheless.

After work, a few of us got together at a local sushi bar for the weekly recommended allowance of social interaction. Ryan and James are the ‘young working’ guys in the group, the others are all postgraduate students at the university, and both are into finance related pursuits. Samantha and Richard are the only couple in the group, both engineers in the making, and a tendency towards nauseating public displays of affection. William is the odd one out, somewhat incomplete in the absence of his ever faithful lab buddy, Theo, both of whom are electrical engineers in the making. Lisa and Danielle make up the arts faculty in our group, both of them pursuing PhD’s in Philosophy.

I’ve always felt just a little out of sync with my friends, some of whom I’ve known since early childhood, but on this day everything felt somehow removed and disjointed. I distinctly remember moments throughout my life where I was staring off into the middle distance and found myself idly wondering when I would wake up from this dream. I usually just shrugged them off, thinking with a smirk that the Matrix must be glitching again. On this Friday, however, something went click in my mind the moment the door to the sushi bar clinked open with the sound of the once cheerful bell, and I felt the dread rise like an inexorable wave of ice wind from my toes right up to making the hair on the back of my neck rise. It was as if my body just took over and reacted without having to take order from my stunned brain. Our table was closest to the door, my seat right next to it in fact, so I could slam the man’s arm up, punch him in the stomach, and grab his gun before anyone could make a sound. I fired the gun at him and fired off another quick succession of eight shots into the men behind him, through the window; eight shots, eight men dead. I turned back to my friends and told them to follow me, for some reason they all did. We ran to an apartment building down the road, entered it through a service entrance and made our way up some stairs and down a few hallways, before entering a room that looks like a basement but isn’t. I had no idea how I’d found the place, but I just knew that it was a safe place to leave my friends. They all trooped in behind me and made themselves comfortable on the couches that occupied the right half of the room. They just looked at me, somewhat dazed and surprisingly calm. “Wait here, I’ll be back before sunrise”, and then I just walked out and closed the door behind me. Memories were stirring, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on anything. I went outside and started walking back toward the sushi bar, waiting for something. There was a faint whooshing sound and I just turned and ran in the direction opposite to where my friends were hiding.

What followed was hours of running and dodging bullets, climbing over walls and fences, sliding down fire escapes and jumping through windows. Most of it’s just a haze of impressions, acting purely on instinct and not stopping to consider the improbability of the moves I was pulling like rabbits from a magician’s hat. What I remember most clearly from that chase was the idea of luring my pursuers to a particular time and place, and the one unforeseen moment where a street kid stepped out of a shadow in an alley unexpectedly. How he stood blinking in incomprehension at me and then turned to look at the men chasing me, the way I nearly tripped over my own feet at the sudden change of direction, the burning as the shot aimed at the child slammed into my heart instead; the determination as I ran right through them all in a desperate bid to distract them from the child and lead them to the trap. I jumped up onto the fire escape right in their midst, forcing them to follow me up. They fired off a few more shots, but nothing hit me. I ran across the roof of the building, down the fire escape on the other side, slipping and landing with a twack on the tarmac...

The Beginning

Thwack. I hit the tarmac with an audible complaint from my jeans and a scorching wave of sensation from the skin on my left side. Without stopping, I use the momentum from my fall to propel me upwards and forwards, twisting out of the bloodstained jacket as I run for the mouth of the alleyway. I round the corner just in time to dodge the bullets sent in hot pursuit by the men chasing me. I weave in and out of the streets and alleyways, keeping careful track of every change in direction; don’t want to lead them back to the others and I certainly do not wish to get myself lost and stuck in a dead-end, and least not yet. The streets are quiet three o’clock in the morning, small mercies. I slow my pace a little, careful to stay within sight but out of the line of fire of my pursuers; can’t have them heading off to find the others or trying some or other harebrained tactic to bring me down. 

One more corner and then I disappear into the shadows of an alley, the dead-end I had been running towards for the past hour. I crouch down low, and merge my consciousness with the shadows and the building, careful to slow my breathing and heart-rate. Absolute quiet reigns for a second and then the usual ambient noises return to the alley, as if there had been no disturbance. Good. The men round the corner, running right past my hiding place. Three, four, six and eight. All accounted for except the one they’d have left at the mouth of the alley, around the corner, just in case – the chaser, the one who always chases his compatriots and serves as the rear guard, in case something happens to the others. Like now. Swift and silent, I jump on the back of the closest man and break his neck before he can warn the others. I drop him silently to the ground, and as I’m straightening up I start shooting, one, two, three, four, five. I drop the gun and slam the man come at me from the right’s gun out of his hand before he can aim it at me. In one fluid motion, I twist his arm, empty of the gun now, and yank him off his feet, driving my right arm into his windpipe and tossing him to the side, twisting and kicking the last man full in the stomach, sending him sprawling onto his back. I duck, pick up number seven’s gun and shoot number eight, turn and shoot number seven with his gun. A rustle and an eddy in the air, I duck just in time to dodge the bullet fired off by the rear guard. I zigzag towards him. He’s moving in slow-motion and can’t get a shot fired at me before I’m already moving in a different direction. I slam his gun arm up, deliver a hard right into his solar plexus, throw him down on the ground while taking the gun from his listless fingers, turn and fire a single shot into his back. Nine, all accounted for. 

I drop the weapon and take a step back, watching as the mist begins to rise from their bodies, waiting until all nine of them have evaporated before I look down at the bloodstain spreading across my shirt, right where my heart was. I touch the stain and my fingers come away covered in blood. My heart rate is normal, no adrenaline pulsing through my veins and the pain I should have been feeling is barely perceptible on the periphery of my senses. My hand drops to my side, I turn my back on the alley and start running back to where I’d left the others, they’ll be worried if I don’t return quickly.