Vashanna typed out her e-mail and reached for her Gatorade. It was a new type, tasted like crap, but she didn't have anything else that was cold. Her cousin in Japan wanted to know if she was going to go through with the marriage to Brushin. Vashanna didn't really know what to say to that because she hadn't made up her mind yet. Brushin was a brute, even for an elf. As Bugs Bunny would say, 'A big lummox'. Stupid too. That was probably the one thing that kept her from saying yes immediately to the arrangements that her father had made. Stupid father. Stupid Brushin. Damned tradition. Vashanna sighed and sat back, sucking down the last bit of the Gatorade.

"I'll have to remember to tell daddy not to get that kind anymore..." she said to herself as she pushed her glasses back into place.

Heavy Metal By Joshua Trujillo

Part 1 - Home Sweet Home

But there she was, bound by a tradition she knew she couldn't avoid. An elf always had to marry another elf. It wasn't like she actually *wanted* to marry another elf, or, the gods forbid, a human. She just didn't want to marry *anyone* just yet. Maybe when she was older, but geez, she was still a kid. She'd only gotten her last degree twenty years ago and her 79th birthday was a couple days off...What was daddy thinking getting her engaged so young? It just left her exasperated. Her long ears twitched as she heard something close by. Vashanna turned in her chair and tried to stare into the darkness across the room, but light out in the hallway blotted out her nightsight. She heard a familiar scuffle along the floor and sighed.

"You can come in, daddy," she sighed.

A tall, broad man opened the door slightly and poked his tan head inside. He smiled broadly and coughed once, trying to be cute. Vashanna could see why mother chose him. There were times when he WAS cute. Even if his ears were bobbed, but eh, that was the price of freedom in the modern world.

"I didn't know if you were working and I didn't wanna disturb you," he said quietly as he stepped into the room.

"Nah," she smiled, "I was just finishing up some e-mail before heading down to the vaults."

"I think you spend too much time in the vaults, my dear," he raised an eyebrow, "Why don't you take Brushin with you, at least? Get to know the boy."

"Because I'm NOT marrying Brushin, daddy," she huffed, "I thought we'd gone over this..."

"We have dearest," he tried the soft approach, "But a marriage would unite four clans. Four! Plus, you're the only child in one of the clans, which means you have to be married before you have your ears done."

Vashanna absently reached up to her long ears and gently stroked along her right one. It just wouldn't FEEL right to have short ears, like humans. They looked funny. Vashanna knew that the plastic surgery was necessary if she was to have any contact with humans beyond the ones that knew the Elf Kingdoms. Her own clan had lived in her ancestral homes in northern Italy for thousands of years. Inside a mountain, it was not only a fortress, but very much home as well.

"But daaaaaaaaaddy, he's stoopid..." she pouted.

"Unfortunately, yes he is," her father sighed.

"So, why did you engage me to a stupid elf?"

"Because of the lineage ties," he sighed again, "You know we have to keep them going..."

"Is it so important in these days?" she asked, "In my archives of the old records, there were some instances of even marrying humans. Besides, I'm not a full elf..."

"Now, just because your great-grandmother wasn't as choosy as we, doesn't mean you can follow her," he said sternly, "What was the penalty for marrying a human back then?"

"Death."

"Yes, it was..."

"If they could catch you."

"Vashanna..."

"There are some other questions that no one seems to be able to answer, father," she said, eager to re-steer the questions, "Like, about the Portal Wars..."

"Those are faerie tales, Vashanna," he said as he sat on her bed.

He flicked a speck of dust from his Armani and looked back to her. She was so young. He didn't feel right about the arrangements of the marriage, but it was best for the clans. She had grown and matured just like any other elf, but she so looked like her mother. Exceptionally pretty-no, not pretty. Beautiful. Even for an elf. She had her mother's pure white hair, matched against her father's mixed-up heritage. Dark skin, white hair and steel gray eyes. Eyes just like her mother's that could be so loving and yet so aloof and cold. He smiled to himself. She didn't have Kyala's temper. She also tended to wear untraditional clothes, which kind of annoyed him, but he supposed that jeans and a red tank top were the way kids were dressing these days. Maybe it was the red velvet choker that made him feel...Uncomfortable. He chuckled once. She was certainly growing up...

Too quickly...

At least her jeans were black denim. He smiled. His only daughter seemed so intent on her mission of archiving all the old records. Of course, it was an honorable thing for someone so young as she, but he would have almost preferred she take up something vacuous, like her brother. He knew it would one day come to the point that she'd want to know more about the oldest records, the ones which even he had no access. Unfortunately, she had complete access to the family vault. The elders, in all the inane wisdom, gave her complete access because they were eager for the records to be archived. Vashanna was very complete in scanning in the old records, touching them up, translating them and such. She'd already restored several ancient scrolls that revealed much of the ancient elfin world. A time before humans. A time before hiding. The Portal Wars were supposed to have happened two thousand years before that time.

"How does the faerie tale go again, Vashanna?" he asked.

"You know how it goes..." she turned back to her computer.

"I meant, have you dug up any new information?" he asked, "And besides, you tell it so well...Your mother would have loved to listen to you."

Vashanna turned and softly smiled at him. Mother was a storyteller in her younger days and it had been so very painful when she died so young. She was only a couple hundred years old. Hardly an adult. Vashanna sighed. Mother would indeed have liked the old tales.

"No new information, daddy," she said, "But the story says that, fourteen thousand years ago, elves first came to this planet from another dimension, that we were a pan-dimensional race, traveling from one planet to another as we tried to find a place to call home. I still haven't been able to find anything to say why we left our original planet in the first place, though..."

"You may not," he said, "If it was that long ago and longer, there may BE no records that have survived."

"I'd thought of that too," she continued, "Anyway, when they came here, they found a planet diverse enough and young enough for an ancient people to make their home on. The humans back then were hardly a threat and were paid no heed. We built mighty empires and had peace among our people for a thousand years. Then, some who could never find contentment wanted to leave. To find another planet. Since this would mean all of the elves involved, there were many who didn't want to leave. Thus began a war of three hundred years in which many elves were killed. In the end, it was chosen that the kingdom of the dissenters would be annihilated with one last, huge attack. After that, the records are kinda fuzzy. Certainly we had peace again until the humans gained prominence, but that wasn't for an additional two to three thousand years..."

Her father sighed and got up from the bed.

"You'll make a fine wife one day, my dear," he said as he hugged her, "And I'll consider giving you freedom from my commitment to Brushin. But please daughter, at least try to make friends with the boy."

Vashanna giggled slightly.

"Yes, father."

Vashanna whistled as she wheeled her cart back down towards the vault area. The vault, being the clan records for most of the clans in Europe, was the most hidden, most secret place in the entire mountain complex. She slowed her cart and looked back at the elevator. She was now fifteen floors below the 'basement' of the villa. Of course, her own room was two floors below the basement, but that was neither here nor there. She smirked and continued on her journey. She stopped at a dead end and walked up to a flat section of the wall.

She placed her hand on the wall and it lit amber for a second, then faded. She walked back to the cart and wheeled it into the vault elevator as its doors opened. The door closed and she inserted the little key into its place above the flat panel on the door. Another panel slid open and she had to perform another palm read before she got another green light. Vashanna rubbed her neck as she counted off three more floors before the door opened again. Those were the family burial chambers. She didn't like to think about those, but it was where mother was. She shivered slightly and began to cart down the long hall to the last door. Another palm reader and the doors swung open slightly. She pulled on the ancient iron knockers and shoved the cart inside. She closed the door behind her and huffed.

So much security, and they didn't even realize that the archives she was creating were stored on her computer. Of course, that was about seventeen floors up and, as the elders would see it, completely unsecure. She smirked. She liked it that way too. No human or elf could crack her codes, that was granted, but they'd still see it as unsecure. They were insecure. The motion detectors caught her movement in the doorway and lit the giant hall with a soft, amber glow. Vashanna looked around the great stone cavern. It wasn't a natural cave, but even still, the scale awed her. There were close to twelve thousand years worth of history stacked up in this vault, and Vashanna had taken it upon her self to archive it all. She shook her head and smiled slightly. She must be nuts.

"Vatheryth el..."

She snuffled slightly at the saying. It was something that her grandfather taught her. Part of the old language, and part of the reason that she took up translation and archiving. Her grandfather. She snuffled again. Must've been the dust. She sighed and wheeled the cart back down the vast aisles, looking for the places to return the scrolls with which she'd finished.

She looked at the back wall. There was another vault back there. There with the oldest of records that she could get to, it was back there. Sure, she'd been warned not to pry too deeply, but why? Why? What were the elders hiding? Could she find out? Vashanna noticed the slight green glow coming from the wall. It was another palm reader. She looked down at the scrolls she'd put on her cart. Most of them were no more than a couple thousand years old, but what was behind that door? She sneezed slightly in the ancient dust and looked around, like someone would catch her thinking about what she was going to do. Of course, aside from the elders, no one else had access to the vaults. But did that access extend to this door as well? The worst they could do was kill her, and she seriously doubted the elders would demand it. Even if they did, she'd be sent away and she could survive on her own. Her brother did it and he was a moron. She could do it.

Of course, he *wanted* to do it...

She huffed slightly and set a determined look on her face. Vashanna was determined to, if nothing else, find out. She strode to the panel and examined it in the darkness. The illumination from the panel itself was enough to tell her that it was just like the elevators, a single palm reader. Hesitating slightly, she placed her palm on the reader, hoping that it wouldn't set off an alarm. The little light on the reader wove back and forth over her palm and flashed a happy green.

"Light is green, trap is clean," she muttered to herself.

She liked the movies that humans came up with, even if she couldn't understand the humor sometimes. She pushed on the panel and a small door groaned open, like it hadn't been used in a *very* long time. More dust whiffed up from her entrance and she coughed slightly as she tried to wave it off.

In the room beyond the door, there was a simple table set into an otherwise empty room. She looked around for other panels, but could find nothing but solid stone. Even the dust was confined to the doorway. Evidently, this was the room for some very old documents. On the simple table, there set four scrolls of a style she'd never seen before. Her nightsight, plus the slight illumination from the vault behind her set the four scrolls in an eerie light. The ends of the scrolls were capped in what looked like gold. The handles were inset with gems of all kinds. She was no jeweler, but Vashanna suspected that the gems were probably flawless. Her curiosity overcoming her sense of anything else, she carefully gathered the scrolls in her arms and headed back out the door. There was an examination table near the front of the vault. She'd set it up to do cursory studies of the scrolls she took, to better help with translation. It also helped her place the scrolls in the history of the people, the context in which the scroll was made.

The little globes of light were nice enough to get the scrolls from the shelves by, but she needed the light on the table. Even though it hurt her eyes a bit, she flipped on the light and laid the scrolls on the table. She gasped slightly at the artistry and the work on the end caps. They were simply exquisite. The gold, the gems, the little (what looked like silk) ties that bound the scrolls, all were of undoubtedly the highest quality. Vashanna unwrapped the first scroll and frowned slightly. The paper wasn't paper. In fact, she couldn't readily identify what kind of thing it was. It felt like vinyl, but had incredible toughness (she actually tried tearing off a piece to look at later) and yet was as thin as the most fragile parchment. She also gasped at the writing. It was clean. It was clear and incredibly legible. What the Hell could print something that would still be legible after twelve thousand years? Vashanna was utterly taken aback.

And then she began to read.

Joshua "Gargoyle" Trujillo "Stone Cold Protector of the Righteous"

Wanna take a ride?

Moving fast to beat the devil, Arms too short to box with God.

Time counts and keeps countin'