Timelines: What if Spain Failed to Control the World?

AlexanderPrimus said:

I'm awaiting it eagerly.

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Haha I always feel like I'm in such transition sometimes XD . Will work on it right now XD

General_BT said:

Wonderful interview as always, canonized. So wonderful it seems the NKVD has caught wind of you. Here's to no 'Black Marias' in your future!

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Haha thank you XD

Grubnessul said:

You're late!

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Sorry about that XD Maybe I forgot to tell you guys that I moved back to California for the summer now that school's out so i'm even 3 hours further behind from when I used to be . XD

RGB: update is now !

6 April 1610

Riku clawed at the slime faster and faster. Mounds of gunk moved from the slowly dissolving image of Raul and splashed in frenzied clumps to the left and right. Madeleine had already made the jump to the island and had begun digging her gloved hands into the dark water as well.

Raul could barely see them from between his irises and the half shaded visages of the two above the surface. He could feel a slight tickle of rotted water touch his body as those hands from above penetrated into the water below and attempted to grasp his slipping figure. There was something else, however, that made him view those above him more distantly than he really was. That is, he felt something underneath him, like a voice calling him from behind his eyeballs beckoning him to view into the ebony abyss.

“So you're here, too,” Raul repeated, sighing out some precious air out of his lungs.

“Yes, I'm here, too,” the voice said back from beneath his flooding ears.

“Why are you here?” Raul attempted to ask.

“ You knew I would be here,” the voice said back to him.

“I'm losing air,” Raul sighed out again.

“Are you going to ask me to give you some air now?” the voice laughed at him.

“What do you--”

“From my lips to yours?” the voice asked with a half serious laugh.

Raul could feel himself blushing despite the frigidity of the liquid around him. “I remember now why you're supposed to stay here.”

“And yet you come visit me at the very last minute of your life, Raul. You hypocrite. Wanting kisses at this time of your existence, too.” The voice almost hissed at him as it spoke. There was no response. Raul's body seemed to stiffen both at the thought and from the lack of breath. Oxygen accumulated in his heart and brain and the minute passed on with only these two most vital points sustained. “Pathetic,” the voice said, “you keep me here for all these years just because you couldn't handle it, could you?”

“Handle?” Raul feebly replied. The last of his air became a sickly bubble formed around his mouth.

“It's happened again, hasn't it?” the voice taunted him. “It's why you're joining me in Styx, Raul. You let Willem die just like you let her die decades ago. Just like you let me die.”

“She's not dead!” and here the bubble in front of Raul's mouth burst and the sickening liquid entered into his mouth. “She... we will use... the Timepiece to get her back.”

“You first let her down and that's why she left us!” the voice accused.

Raul felt as if he dreamed his head shaking a negative response. “No...” he tried to say.

“You've even forgot who she was, haven't you?” the voice said lowering the tone.

“No... don't say that... I haven't,” Raul weakly combated. “I keep her...”

“Close to your heart,” the voice snickered. “Only children would say something like that. Only children would lead their friends on a quest to satisfy their own ends and masking it under the guise of helping this country you don't even feel loyal enough to--”

“No!” Raul could not tell if it was tears coming out of his eyes or the salty sting of the Styx water invading his lids. “Willem... he wanted to help me... So did Riku... it was just a coincidence that...”

“That Willem died? That you're going to leave Madeleine and Riku trapped in this insane labyrinth for dead?”

“I... no... that's not what I'm doing...”

“Then,” the voice asked, “tell us her name again. Remind us that you still remember. Do you remember who she is?”

“Just wait,” Raul said back. “Once we get the Timepiece...”

“You don't remember her name,” the voice said flatly. “I'm even starting to wonder if you even understood what the Timepiece is.” The sounds of bubbles surrounded Raul and drowned out the muffled screams of the man and woman above him.

Even the image of Madeleine and Raul faded from his view as his eyes drifted close. Strangely enough, it was as if he meditated on the statement given to him and he replied with a silent recitation. “Our world has a Timepiece that fell from Heaven.”

The voice was quiet as he said those words for them. “It is because at the beginning of creation, we chose the fruit of knowledge instead of the fruit of life,” the voice contributed.

“And so it is for the Men of the Silence to protect the Timepiece and the Keys,” Raul stated in sequence.

“Because one day, they will all finally return.”

“The ones who ate from the tree of life.”

“And so,” that voice finally said with some measure of satisfaction, “do you remember her now?”

The question made the scars all over Raul's body burn against his skin even in the cold death of the surrounding Styx. “Yes...” he admitted to himself with a rush of agony. “She is--” a stab of pain erupted in his throat. His eyes shot open and it was only then did he realize that a sword was slicing its edge along his clothes leaving a shallow cut of red along his torso.


Zeren leaped onto the next building as inconspicuously as a crow flying through a starless sky. He immediately rolled into a sitting position against one of the corners of the parapet before tossing himself over and somersaulting onto a nearby canopy. He slid down like a ball onto the dirt of the alley. Already, the sound of the constable and his men rushing through the streets interrupted the heavy sleep of the town.

The young man crouched against the side of the wall as the other men ran through his vision. One of the more zealous deputies looked down the alley, but Zeren had already crouched behind one of the barrels that housed whatever waste the local industry produced. As the sounds of footsteps wafted back into the night, Zeren noticed the signal from the other street being given.

Like some resurgent tongue of flame, Abdullah's rising arm was illuminated by a torchlight. Zeren ran across. “I took the liberty of delivering the money ubiquitously to the drop off points we agreed,” Abdullah told him, “but I'm surprised you were found out.”

Zeren did not answer but pulled at his elder companion's arm and brought him deeper into the confines of that opposite alley. The torch was hidden once more. “Leyla was in that house I was just in,” Zeren explained.

“That's excel—”

“She killed the wife in there.”

Abdullah's brow furrowed in confusion. “I'm sure there was a reason to it,” the older one said while kneading out the confusion in his words with a snapping of his dried tongue as he spoke. “Perhaps--”

The older one said no more as the dim expression on the insufficiently lit face told him that no simple words at the moment could dispel the fears of the younger man with him. “Was this a mistake?” Zeren asked, bewildered.

“It would only be a mistake if you refused to go through with it,” Abdullah said sternly enough to pull Zeren's wandering eyes back to him. “You have come this far not to falter at all in your faith in the young lady. You know as well as I do that you would not have done this without knowing that Leyla is an honourable woman.”

Zeren tossed those words in his head. “But I don't understand why she would kill that merchant's wife.”

“It might be something you'll have to ask her yourself,” Abdullah replied placing a heavy hand on Zeren's shoulder.

The younger one complied with a nod and pushed off from the side of the building. “All the more reason to find her now, I suppose,” he said to his companion who readily agreed with the change in the young man's countenance. “We should only be a day or so behind her...”

Abdullah smiled and made a gesture towards where he stowed the horses. As the two walked through the dark passageways of the town, Zeren could not help but think back for any clues. The image of the dead woman on the bed with the poison container-- Leyla's trademark-- still lingering could not escape from his thoughts and haunted it like some persistent fog. Leyla had always used glass vials like the ones seen on the sheets of the recently deceased. As a woman, it was one of the things that she needed to do in order to get noticed by the men in charge of the underground operations in Constantinople. It was not enough that she had the precious beautiful looks of an aristocrat, she also needed that wit and resourcefulness that would make her useful. The vials were proof that the kills were hers and, as such, could not be denied by the men of the underground.

Leyla had been in many places of the vast Imperial domains of the Turks. She had even worked in Hungary and in Persia. Nonetheless, she always enjoyed annoying that little soldier that had protected her ever since they were children-- even if she was raised to have been more adept at protecting herself. It was something Zeren knew, yet he also experienced how Leyla rather enjoyed it when he would come in between her and some lowlife scum in the Imperial Academy. It was more than the sum of her cultural heritage speaking-- it reinforced for both of them who they were. Zeren was the boy becoming a gentleman and Leyla was the worthy lady.

“And because of that,” Zeren though to himself, “you should be an example of virtue... but why did you have to kill her? What did she do?”

Then again, Zeren thought to himself, he did not know much about the way Leyla was commissioned as an assassin in the first place. He never knew about her targets or how she was given those assignments. The only thing he knew was that it was always by some concoction that they were dispatched. He had always seemed to assume that they were either political enemies of the Sultan or foreign foes. He did not give any thought that it might be simple merchants. Even if Leyla was merely trying to help the peasants here, it did not require some stealthy murder of some wife, did it? Was he missing something?

Who was it exactly that Leyla has been killing? For a second, a chill possessed his limbs and traveled down his back all the way to his legs. He had a strange feeling that he was forgetting something; forgetting something about that girl.


Raul had been quiet for the rest of the hops past the final islands and into the corridor leading to the next ring. Madeleine and Riku did their best in cleaning him from all of the growth of the marsh while Raul spent a good deal of time vomiting out tortuous liquid. The cut on his belly where Riku literally had to slice through the slime stung him, but it served to keep him sober from the nauseating stench of the goo.

He had barely thanked the young man for saving his life, but the other two seemed subdued as well. It was as if the ordeal with Willem and the close call with Raul had left them emotionally exhausted. Raul did not resist the quiet. His eyes wandered the dimly lit floor with the echo of the conversation he had still ringing in his wet ears.

“The next circle will lead us to the City of Dis,” Madeleine explained. “It is where we make the transition from Upper Hell into Lower Hell. We, here, enter the sins of the intellect.” The explanation had lost the luster of Dantisi pride that it once had. There was nothing for Madeleine to be excited about anymore. It was just another occasion for them to die.

The corridor leading to the next chamber was a special one, and it caught the wary eye of the three as they proceeded down the darkened path. Gargoyle like statues ringed the ceiling and walls as diabolical archways of devils and demons.

“What's inside this next circle?” Riku asked.

“The heretics,” Madeleine replied. “For Dante, the chief of these men would be the Epicurean heretics. That is, those who denied the resurrection and afterlife. They reasoned that since there was no afterlife, there was no need for prudence or temperance in the mortal life. Dante viewed heresy as just an excuse by individuals to deny morality and sin through an abuse of their intellects. Basically, that they pretended to reason well in order to merely justify their petty goals. Dante says how this is the root of heresy-- justification of evil deeds for the sake of expedience or pleasure. Because the Epicureans denied the resurrection, they indulged in debauchery while justifying it. Their punishment, is therefore, to eternally burn in graves. Since they denied eternal life, so they will spend eternal life buried like the dead.”

As soon as Madeleine finished, they had arrived at the grand entranceway to the City of Dis-- to Lower Hell. Swarming with figures of devils, there were spears and tridents jutting out in various positions as if the door itself would resist invaders. Raul attempted to press it open like all the others, but it would not budge.

Riku was the first to notice the strange writing lining the doorway. “A code perhaps?” he asked. Madeleine similarly noticed them and approached the inscriptions with another torch. She noticed, furthermore, that several of the symbols on the writing matched emblems that the devil figurines held on their foreheads.

“The weapons...” Raul noted to the others as he touched the pitchforks and spears of the devils, “they move in and out a little bit. “A lock mechanism maybe?”

“Maybe if we...” Madeleine observed while pulling and pressing the weapons in the order she saw on the doorframe. One by one, she pulled and pressed against the weapons hoping to find a combination that would unlock the doorway. She was just about to handle the final weapon when she seized herself and stepped back. “No... we can't do that,” she nearly stuttered.

“What's wrong?” Riku asked quickly.

“This was the same mistake Dante and Virgil made,” Madeleine began to explain. “At the walls of Dis, Virgil-- the incarnation of Human Reason-- attempted to negotiate with the devils-- the representatives of intellectual evil-- for a passage into Dis. They were nearly captured, however, since the devils attempted to trick them. In this part of Hell, it's no longer about endurance... these are the sins of the intellect. Human reason alone cannot negotiate with evil. In the epic, Dante and Virgil were saved by an angel embodying Divine Revelation. Human reason is enough to handle the monsters of upper Hell, but against this kind of sin--”

“You'd need a higher power,” a voice behind them interrupted their revelations, “preferably, an emissary from God. You're lucky I brought one with me.”

As the others turned around, they managed to see Renault de Fronsac emerged from the shadows of the corridor with a priest at his side. “Uncle!” Madeleine shouted.

“We don't have much time,” Renault quickly looked at the astonished three with a serious face, “we were followed down here. I have the key to this door. After that, I'll be relying on the three of you to get us past the most dangerous level you've had to experience yet-- the heretics' burning tombs.


“This-- it's a coffin!” Tom protested.

“Get in,” Pablo tersely reiterated while pointing towards a casket on the far side of the room.

Tom had been terrified to follow Pablo out while both were dressed in the costumes of the janitorial staff. It was not necessarily the prospect of getting caught that frightened him, but his thoughts on how this man had only so recently dispatched Taguchi-- or at least from what Rodrigo had told him-- scared him to even walk so close to the man. His apprehension increased when he realized that they had walked straight into the morgue.

“It's your way out,” Pablo did not even turn to look at Tom, but kept his eyes towards the exit doorway and the vehicle waiting for them across the yard. Several guards were making their rounds in between the two of them and the getaway van. “If you want to get out of here without getting caught, you'll have to get in.”

“No-- this---” Tom attempted to say once again, but a fist found his lips before he could finish his sentence. His consciousness left him and Pablo cradled him into the coffin before shutting it securely.

It was a simple casket... not made of any particular wood or other precious material. Instead, it was one of those caskets that made transport easier. Maybe that's what disturbed him the most-- it resembled those kind of coffins; the ones he would always see on tour. He cocked his gun and stuffed it underneath his costume and between the rear of the rim of his pants and his back. If the disguise failed, he would have to resort to what he had learned best from those days watching his comrades die in distant jungle lands-- violently shoving bullets into other human beings.

Chapter CIII: The Violent against Neighbor (coming soon)

robou said:

Hurrah! Raul is saved and Renault arrived! All seems to be going ok. I wonder what is the truth behind the murder of the Merchants wife... what is Leyla up to?

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Yes , Renault is finally reunited with the rest of them XD

Avernite: World of the second Timepieces ? you'll have to explain that one ROFL .

RGB: Not was whiney XD He is older , after all .

AlexanderPrimus: Thank you , sir !

comagoosie: yes , Renault knows the ins and outs of the place

JimboIX: ROFL , i am a tease XD

Capibara: yep ! especially in Lower Hell

Kurt_Steiner: ROFL , that's a bit after their time

Grubnessul: ROFL , still sticking to your guns , eh ? XD

English Patriot: Why do YOU pilot Eva ?!