[ 05 - CHAPTER FIVE ]

― aftermath of a broken promise ―

No matter how hard Orion tried, he couldn't seem to shake the feeling that he had done something horrendous. The long-forgotten screams of his sister still shattered his eardrums, and her desperate and devastated pleas still jarred his skull as if it had been hit by an asteroid. Now, Titania remained dormant in her position by the table in the center of the room, her wailing ceased and her features stone-cold, but it made no difference. Orion still had an unsettling feeling in the pit of his stomach that he couldn't quite put his finger on.

His first line of warriors were struck down the moment they set foot on land. Their deaths were among the most gruesome Orion had ever laid his eyes on, ranging from decapitations to obliteration from laserfire and everywhere in between, but he still refused to order a retreat. In the prince's twisted and confused mind, they would still be able to pull a victory out of their back pocket if they played their cards correctly.

The fact that Mars Apophis had yet to be struck down didn't encourage Orion to back down, either. He was looking forward to that particular soldier's liquidation. Why would he leave before he got the chance to see the look in the ex-officer's eyes as he was murdered in the most brutal manner?

"Orion, we need you over here," Titania spoke without looking up from the maps that lay in front of her. She was trying her best to hide it, but Orion could see right through her counterfeit demeanor just by listening to the slight waver in her voice. She was scared to death that their troops would perish.

"Of course," Orion responded, striding over to where Titania and Athena stood. He'd been standing on the cruiser's balcony overlooking the battle that was playing out below them, and he hadn't been able to tear his eyes away from it until Titania spoke him out of his reverie. His gaze always seemed to fix on war in any situation.

The clicking of Orion's boots against the hard flooring ceased as he stopped mid-stride to stand next to his sister. He gently placed a hand on her shoulder, but it was instantly brushed off, earning a befuddled frown from Orion.

Titania shot her brother a glare. "Do not touch me again," she hissed, the burning fire in her eyes dancing more angrily than Orion could have imagined she was capable of. "After what you have done...after the irreparable damage your actions are about to cause our people...you will not act like you didn't just break a promise that meant so much. I won't allow it."

Orion nodded. He winced at the sharp pain he felt in his heart, but he had hope that it would pass soon. When the Sarosian army decimated Cygnus, and they were able to storm the capital as they'd originally planned, he was certain Titania would be more forgiving. His broken promises did not mean nothing.

"Why did you need my assistance?" he asked.

His eyes strayed to the documents that laid before the trio. Last-ditch effort battle plans lie among maps of Cygnus and its capital, and they were not plans that Orion could say he had full confidence in. When he'd handpicked a plan of attack that centered around an element of surprise, he'd done so for a reason. They would have to devise another plan that utilized that same element. Otherwise, they would stand no chance against the brute force of Cygnus' armed forces.

Athena pushed her many braids behind her shoulder before speaking, "We can't seem to come to a consensus of what plan to use. Your advice would be welcome."

"Don't use any of them."

Athena rose an eyebrow, unable to mask her shock at what Orion had said. "Pardon?"

Orion shrugged. "None of those plans will work against what we're facing out there. They have weapons we didn't know existed. Their army is at least twice the size of ours. The only way we'll win this is if we take them by surprise, and the only way that can be done is if we create a new plan from scratch."

"With all due respect, Your Highness, our troops are already on the ground. What surprise could we possible conjure at this point?" Athena questioned. Her words were slow and careful, as if she was afraid to speak against Orion, but still bold enough that anyone could tell she had a basis for her thoughts.

Titania shook her head. "There's no need to concern yourself with respect, Officer Pakhet. Orion deserves none. Not when he's sharing his wretched death wish the rest of us."

Orion felt an ache in his chest again. This time, however, it took more than a few moments' time brush it to the side.

He wasn't sure why Titania had such a vendetta against him. Granted, he did break the only promise she'd forced him to make since they were children gallivanting around in the palace's playground, but that didn't compromise his identity as the best strategist Saros had seen in decades. It only seemed natural for her to trust his decisions when it came to warfare, broken promise or not.

Orion chose to ignore Titania's offhand comment when he next spoke. "I'm not talking about surprising them in the most obvious sense." The natural-born commander began to circle the table, simultaneously running his fingers along the cool marble surface. "The only way we'll reach our goal is if, instead of waiting for our forces to overcome theirs, we storm Cygnus' headquarters immediately. If we take a few of our best warriors with us, the job will be done before our armies suffer too great a loss."

"You've got to be joking," Titania scoffed. "How impetuously ignorant can you get? You must've fallen asleep in every one of the lessons Castor gave us, because any fool would be smart enough to realize that we can't storm their headquarters if we can't get through that!"

With her last statement, Titania jerked a finger in the direction of the thousands of men that stood between the cruiser and the Cygnus palace. Even Orion had to admit, she had a point. It would be rather difficult to maneuver their way through the masses without getting an arm sliced off or losing their treasured element of surprise. Nonetheless, it was their last hope. If they didn't make an effort to cut off the head of the snake before the teeth could do too much damage, their conquest would be for nothing and their soldiers would all die.

Just as Orion opened his mouth to offer a rebuttal of his own, a wave of heat passed throughout the ship. Dull smoke began to cloud the windows. A white light, so bright that Orion had to shield his eyes in order to avoid being blinded, emanated from the ground below them.

As soon as the light faded, Orion raced to the balcony to gain a better viewpoint of where the pulsing heat had come from. The culprit of the explosion was astonishingly easy to pick out from among the crowd of people and machinery, as smoke still puffed out of its muzzle, and Orion let out a string of curses that his mother would've slapped him for using.

"What was that?" Athena inquired, her voice shaking so much that her words were hardly understandable.

Orion's mouth hung open. He tried to explain to Athena what had just occurred, but he could not muster up the words to describe what he saw before him.

Where he'd just seen thousands of his warriors only a couple moments earlier, each one of them racing forward to meet their enemies, lay a pile of ash and dirt. Blood streaked the side of his newly polished ship like a deranged abstract painting. The revolting smell that wafted through the air had somehow managed to make its way inside the ship's bulletproof walls and to Orion's nostrils, and he had to fight to avoid disgorging every substance he'd eaten in the past week. In all the wars Orion fought, in all the horrific sights he was subject to observe, he never could've imagined a fate so torturous as the one he saw before him.

A countless number of his soldiers had already suffered a bloody death before the white light had even seared through the air, but that didn't make the light any less traumatizing to those who were unfortunate enough to witness its effects. A single explosion had succeeded in wiping out nearly all of Saros' men, and Orion had been powerless to stop it. In fact, he hadn't even known it was happening.

The Sarosians that remained on the battlefield were too few and far between to count. He managed to spot the blue insignia on a few men's armor when it wasn't covered by the blood of their comrades, but other than that, the dwindling amount of soldiers that were left made Orion's heart stop.

"New plan," Orion managed to choke out despite his continuous gasps for breath and petrified mind. "We pray for deliverance from this bloodbath."

◈◈◈

Human bone was more saturated than Orion had imagines. Maybe it was just the severed tissue and ligaments that still hung off of the skull fragments he held in his hand, or maybe it was pieces of brain matter that had imploded itself into the skull during the explosion, but whatever it was, Orion curled his lip at the dampness of the skeleton.

Ashes floated in circles around him, giving new meaning to the song he'd learned as a child. He let out a harsh chuckle at the very thought of how he and his siblings used to sing so merrily about something so grisly. Even Cosmo, who would hardly glance at Orion now, would join Titania and Orion as they held hands and danced in a ring while singing of ashes falling out of the sky. The blissful ignorance of a child was worthy of an incomparable sort of jealousy.

From the moment Cygnus had pulled the trigger on an underground explosion - the same explosion that nearly blinded Orion with its brightness - all was lost for the people of Saros. In a moment, in the same amount of time that it would take a person to blink, almost the entire Sarosian army had been decimated. They were gone without a trace, as were Orion's hopes that he would come out victorious. After all, what good was a prince without his people? What good was a general without his army?

Fortunately, Orion hadn't been forced to surrender. Following the explosion, the Cygnans had simply turned around and marched back toward their headquarters. Orion could only assume it was part of the deal they made with his father. If Castor provided them with the intel that would prevent his son from succeeding and, consequently, ensure Cygnus' king survived, Cygnus would avoid killing Orion and Titania. Orion almost wished he had died in the battle. At least then he wouldn't be left stumbling among the leftovers of his men, wondering who each empty skull belonged to.

The battlefield he walked on was eerily silent except for muffled, heart-wrenching sobs that could be heard for miles. The dark-haired man, clean of blood and scars, had no need to search for the source of the crying. He knew who the wails of sorrow belonged to.

"Titania," he croaked. "Oh, Titania, I am so sorry."

Even as he uttered apologies to himself and to the abandoned weaponry around him, he realized a simple apology would hold no substance when he faced Titania. At the moment, she was somewhere far off in the distance, mourning alongside her loyal officer, but the time would soon come when Orion would be forced to see her face-to-face.

He would beg for her forgiveness. There was no way around that. He couldn't help but think that if he had listened to her, if he had kept his promise, none of what he was looking at would be a reality. Admittedly, Orion would be sitting in his office, shameful and humiliated because of his failed mission, but temporary probation could not compare to the sights of horror his actions had caused. For what he'd done to Titania. What he'd done to his own people, who he'd sworn to protect and serve at any cost, if only they did the same for him.

And they did. But he, the crown prince of Saros who sat so high upon his miserable throne, had not been considerate enough to do the same in return.

He was left, alone amidst amputated body parts and isolated heads, wondering what to do with himself. He could not return to Saros. The punishment he would face there would surely be worse than anything he'd ever inflicted upon any of his soldiers. For once, Orion would be the first to admit that he deserved whatever torture the court wished to test on him. He deserved much worse than the men of the court's simple minds could come up with. He probably would have turned himself in to the king if he hadn't been so terrified.

So he would have to run. If he could manage an escape from Saros as soon as he returned and collected supplies for himself, then he'd be free. He wouldn't have to face any of the charges that would doubtless be placed against him, and he would no longer be a danger to Titania or any of the other citizens of Saros who were foolish enough to trust him with their lives.

Orion's decision to flee was one that no one would see coming, which was why it was so perfect. It was in the man's blood to fight, not to run away. Yet, as Titania's screams grew louder and louder, it became easier for Orion to accept his decision. Little did he know, his resolution to run from his problems would be the harbinger of two of the best and worst things to ever happen to him.

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

This chapter was a lot harder to write than I thought it would be. I'm not sure why, but my heart just felt so heavy as I was writing it and I'm genuinely starting to feel bad for Orion. You as a reader might not be yet, but his redemption arc will come, so I can assure you that you will eventually feel sympathy for him.

Oh, and sorry about the really descriptive parts about the bones and blood. I'm not sure where that came from?? Honestly this had me concerned for my mental health a little but it'll be fine.

As always, thanks for reading, and feel free to leave a comment and ask some questions!

Q: WHAT IS THE MOST EMBARRASSING THING THAT'S HAPPENED TO YOU?