spyriax's lego sideblog

Any who have the misfortune of knowing me know I have a rather selective view of what constitutes Bionicle. Essentially I consider Bionicle to have run from 1998 to mid 2002. As a kid I was a die hard fan until 06, where a combination of the marketing and the sets just not being very good caused me to gradually lose interest until I just got one set in 07 and never again bought a Bionicle.

All this preamble is to say that for the longest time I never really knew all that much about Voya-Nui, apart from it being the namesake of a terrible game. Later on, as I got back in to the hobby I heard rumors, dark, twisted rumors. They spoke of a stick making the island fly underwater through a hole, that the island itself was ejected from the body of the robot and left a Voya-Nui sized hole in a continent. Just the ravings of a mad man, so I threw it in the bin along with everything in Bionicle after the Toa go in to the Bohrok hives in 02 and moved on with my life.

Fast forward to now, and Christian Faber starts releasing some development materials through a humanoid water fowl, and this very interesting image is among what's released

This image made everything click for me and I fell in love with Voya-Nui as a concept.

But I think before revealing the original intent, its important to explain the "canon" sequence of events surrounding the so called "Island of Doom"

ISLAND OF DOOM, A PRIMER

Okay so there's a big robot sleeping in an ocean, one day its heart pops and a chunk of land that was on top of the heart breaks out of its chest and starts floating in the ocean. The island, I must add, survived this event, as the hole it left is the same shape and size as the final island.

Now the island floats around for a bit, the volcanic crater on it eventually builds up a large land mass in the middle of the bay, the people on it (yes there were people on the island when it got ejected, and they survived the event) decide that this is the best place to build a city.

It turns out that wasn't the best place to build a city as the new land mass breaks off and somehow anchors it to the sea floor.

Eventually some guys show up and break the anchor cord and the island, inexplicably, sinks down under the water, and manages to go right back in to the hole it made and everything returns to normal.

In some blog post it was explained that there was a magic wand that fixed everything that was used at the same moment.

This is the canonical sequence of events.

More like island of dumb¹.

THE ORIGINAL CONCEPTS

Okay now that all that unpleasantness is out of the way, we can start with the actually interesting things.

There are so many details to cover here, I think the best way to organise them would be to present everything roughly chronologically.

The scenario is the same, a massive robot crash lands in a large ocean, its completely under the water outside of its face, upon which the larger island of Mata Nui forms.

From the beginning its very different, there's no large landmass over the heart (in fact the very idea of the robot itself being full of various domes with islands in them is very suspect but this post is already long enough). The heart is a reactor, and consists of a massive spherical cavity in the chest. Something occurs and the heart pops open, a small panel or valve on the perimeter of the reactor core's wall bursts out of the chest of the robot. Through this hole sea water begins to flood in-this is important!

The ejected panel floats, and some sort of system within it cools it down, causing the sea water to freeze, essentially turning it in to a massive iceberg. There's also mentions of it being magnetic, the final island is described as looking somewhat like a magnet run over a factory floor. It probably also attracted debris from the sea bed as it floated through the seas. As you can see in that diagram the core is filled with massive long cables and the island eventually gets anchored by a long cable, so that's possibly where that came from!

Over years the island grows and grows as it floats around the oceans, being buffeted around by the currents. Eventually part of it becomes unstable and breaks off, sinking to the ocean floor, and since a large cable was attached to both pieces, it anchors the island in place.

Now we get to the crucial part. In the canon depiction of events the most baffling thing is why does breaking the anchor rope make it sink? Now we come back to this image:

When the panel popped out it left a hole. Water is pouring back in to the hole, forming a giant whirlpool. The robot is so massive that even after all these years of constant flooding the cavity on the inside is still not even half full. Voya-Nui was caught in the whirlpool's strong currents when the island broke up. This impromptu anchor stopped it just as it was about be pulled in! Then the super strong currents from the whirlpool gave it the distinctive curved shape.

So now we know why destroying the cable holding it in place causes the floating island to sink: once untethered its free to be pulled in to the whirlpool! The island that formed around the panel would break off and the panel would basically be a giant plug and stop the flow of water flooding in to the reactor.

Figuring this all out was such a revelation, taking one of the most nonsensical sequences of events in the series and transforming it in to this completely logical scenario which, from the point of view of the characters involved, is still quite mysterious and oblique, but when looked at from the perspective of repairing this giant robot it makes perfect sense.

And we were robbed. Imagine the Mata Nui rising sequence of animations starting off with a whole island being pulled in to a whirlpool.

THE CORE

This is getting a bit beyond the main focus of the island, but I just want to talk about the core itself because there were a few interesting tidbits there as well. Its a very evocative setting which I feel suffered greatly and few of the interesting parts were conveyed well in the story.

The water streaming through the hole is described as having some sort of light emitting reaction to the part of the reactor its hitting, lighting the whole chamber. Steam from the reaction swirls upwards and vaporised materials from the heat of the reaction collect on the roof, forming massive stalactites that eventually fall, creating this jagged forest of stone needles within the massive pool of water, water which's temperature varies depending on how close it is to the reaction.

Really seems a shame that in the final story it was simplified down to "sky" and "swamp". Just imagine, this forest of stone, shrouded in fog, lit by this flickering unearthly light emanating from the centre. You have the added aspect of once Voya-Nui has returned to its rightful place the water fall would cease, leading to the light dwindling until the whole area is pitch black.

MISCELLANEOUS OTHER NOTES

One major feature of the island that was missing from the earlier ice and rock version is the massive lava crater, supposedly from the mask of life². I had been toying with the idea that the volcano formed the rest of the island around the panel, but with how much larger the island was it just didn't make sense, so the ice and magnetism really helped out there!

Its said that the ice formed as some sort of self defence mechanism, like an organ freezing itself to preserve itself in an emergency. Personally though I have this little idea that the panel was actually something like the cooling system for the reactor, and without it the reactor was going to over heat, but luckily it was kept just cool enough by the falling water. The cooling system, being linked somehow to the main robot, detects that the reactor was over heating and starts working over time to cool it, leading to it freezing the surrounding ocean and making itself in to a massive iceberg, but as it wasn't connected to the robot's core and nothing it did had any effect, it ends up overheating itself, causing the pool of lava on the top. But that's just a little fan idea.

Another one I have is that the island, when it was floating freely, may have passed next to Mata Nui, close enough to be sailed too, at some point far in the past. Explaining how there would be inhabitants on it despite it getting shot out of the robot like a bullet.

Also it would be remiss of me to not mention that even though the canon depiction of events makes no sense, the whirlpool is briefly seen in the 100% ending of the torture device Bionicle Heroes.

But this is much smaller, and seems to only have just opened up in the bay. Rather than being something to do with the hole it made it seems this is more about how the mask they were seeking went underwater.

SCALE!

Time to talk sizes!³

This drawing is especially useful here, as it shows all 3 major objects in question all relative to each other. Yes Voya-Nui is there, its the tiny little dot on the bottom right. So I simply took the height maps for Voya-Nui, used them to make a quick little model in the same fashion as my Mata Nui, and brought in my old GSR model. I scaled them all to the Mata Nui from my last posts, and guess what! It all lines up perfectly.

The Voya-Nui Model is the exact right size it should be, according to this map:

And what was more impressive, was that the GSR turned out to be pretty much bang on with this even older concept art:

Scaling the GSR was a more bit awkward, as the final design is more gangly compared to this drawing, but lining up the torsos worked really well!

And now let us visit the 1/10th scale Mata Nui and meet Geroge. A new island has floated up off Ta-Wahi beach and he want's to explore a bit!

Excuse the monochrome island, the height maps I'm using are actually quite different from the final island.

There is a height map more accurate to the final island, but that one didn't have an underside. The little islets in the bay were also neat.

The large lava lake in the centre is roughly 250 metres across. Its nothing compared to Mata Nui's caldera, but its still very huge when you get down to the ground level.

The panel that forms the centre of the island is massive as well.

Approximately 550m wide, and 900m tall. Just think of the massive reactor core this thing popped out of!

Seeing it separate from the island really puts it in perspective.

Imagine this thing shooting out of the robot's chest like a bullet.

I'll just quickly mention, earlier on I posted that map of all the internal islands. If you use the size of metru nui on there you can scale Voya-Nui appropriately, and you end up with this.

Its less a small panel popping out of the heart and more the scene from Alien at this point.

CONCLUSION

This has been quite a rambly post, but there was just so much information to cover. I left out a lot of details. This whole thing just makes me very excited, sorry.

I just think its such a beautifully elegant scenario that really adds a lot to the setting and story, rather than just having yet another new island, but this time the island is mean. I find it quite interesting how everything would have sorted itself out, if not for the island breaking in half. There's no Machiavellian plots, no scheming, no betrayal, just an unfortunate occurrence that makes a bad situation worse, and everyone has to work to fix it. It was utterly butchered in the final story. It makes me quite sad for what could have been. Just picture it, this floating island getting pulled towards a massive whirlpool, the outer island breaking off as it spirals deep down underwater until this long, tarnished metal plug is revealed to have been at the centre. With a huge impact it closes up the hole, fitting back perfectly where it came from, managing to avert the disaster of the flood waters growing ever higher inside the core of this robot.

But in any case, really the important take away is, Voya-Nui is just a rip off of Noah's Island when you get down to it.

I'll leave you with a photograph of George waving hello to his large friend.

Have a nice day/night[delete whichever is inappropriate]!

¹-You know its true. ²-Not to be confused with the Mask o' Flight, the film staring a swarm of Tahnok. ³-Please note, I am using 1 kio = .1 km as per my previous posts, if this offends you simply multiply every number in this post by 43.75966487787¾⁴ ⁴-Yes even this one.

*   *   *   *

Takanuva, the Toa of Light, descended the smooth gray staircase slowly, step by step, deeper and deeper into the earth, and with each step he felt himself drawing nearer…nearer to Destiny.

Destiny is a broken machine. The half-remembered words came back to him, and heat pulsed through his mask. A broken machine, crossing the Void...

The words were from the very start, when everything had begun for him. It had been a long time, and much had transpired since then. Victory and defeat. Loss and gain. Death...and rebirth.

The stairs were not carved for someone like him. Too shallow, and steeper than he liked. He was obliged to take them haphazardly, turning his armored feet slantwise, skipping one every now and again. The beings who had designed the stairway had surely never thought he, or one like him, would ever tread there.

Well, that was a failure of their imagination, wasn’t it? They should've known he’d come.

The stairs ended at last: seven hundred and seventy-seven of them exactly, just as Angonce had described on the surface. The exactness of it almost repelled him...almost. That was what it was for, right?

Now he stood in a narrow gray corridor. The floor was smooth, the walls unadorned. There was a pale light ahead, and he walked toward it calmly. The only sound was the click and rasp of his metal footfalls. Then, he emerged.

The room was massive. Walls stretched into gray distance and curved into a ceiling far, far away overhead, traced with lines and seams and twisting titanic pipes. Ahead, the floor rose in tectonic slopes, almost like the surface of the planet above, but smooth, clearly sculpted. Artificial.

Sixteen figures stood on the gentle incline of the hillside before him, and behind them rose a gray shape like a city, veiled in mist. The eyes of the figures glittered as they looked down at him.

His eyes burned in his mask as he looked back.

*   *   *   *

Blazing light, light so bright that it nullified everything and created...blank. Light all around, in every point of space, but devoid of detail. Stark and empty.

Not empty. There was a presence in that sightless place, and he knew that he was not alone. Across an infinite distance it came...to him.

"Who’s there?" he asked.

"I am light," it replied.

"You’re...alive?"

"I am light," it repeated. "I am energy. I am knowledge. I am the flame which crosses the Void."

"I was somewhere else. I was...melting." He felt his spirit shudder. "Is this even real?"

No answer, but the blank, sightless place blazed brighter somehow.

"Am I alive?" he continued. "I’ve had visions before, but not like this..."

"You are fading."

"What?"

"You are almost gone."

"Wait...What’s that supposed to mean? I thought that…I put on the mask, and...and..."

The light did not respond.

"I thought it would be alright," he pressed on. "It was Destiny, wasn’t it? It felt right. The Turaga always said—"

"Destiny is a broken machine, drifting in the Void."

"That...that makes no sense."

"Your knowledge is little. You are almost gone."

"Help me! What can I do? I put on the mask..."

There was a pause. Then:

"To whom is your duty given?"

"My duty? My duty is...to my friends...my people. And to the Great Spirit, of course."

"To me."

"What?"

"Your duty is to me."

"I can’t...that’s not..."

"You put on the mask."

"Yes, but I don’t even know who you are...what you are."

"I am light."

"I was searching for the Toa of Light, me and...my friend. Are you...?"

"I am light. I am energy. I am knowledge..."

"I know. You said that. What is your name? Please..."

"You know it already—the name wrought for me, at least, to channel and contain me. I am AVOHKII. Pledge yourself."

"Avohkii..." The syllables felt sharp and exact in his mind.

"You are almost gone," the light said. "What will you do?"

*   *   *   *

"What will you do...when you get there?" The projection blurred for a moment, and the carved stone of the archway showed behind it, then the image resolved again into the shape of a small, bent Po-Matoran.

"Have you thought that far?" the Matoran continued, always smiling.

Light glinted on the headwaters of the River Dormus, flowing in its ancient track. The river was calm here, unaffected by the events that were transpiring downstream.

"I confess I’m keen to know as well," said Angonce, who had taken up a position on the other side of the stone archway. Not a projection–Flesh and blood. "It seems unwise, especially at a moment like this."

"I will speak with them," Takanuva said at last.

Faint thunder sounded somewhere in the distance, although the sky was cloudless.

"I have already done so. More than once," Angonce said. 

"As have your other allies, as I recall," the Po-Matoran added. "They still intend to follow their Plan."

"I know."

More thunder, but further off. The battle was retreating, it seemed. The tide had turned.

"The gate won’t take you just anywhere, you know," said the Matoran. "And especially not to their City—not without very specific knowledge. Knowledge that I can give you."

"Why? How does this fit your scheme, Velika?"

"I seek only to preserve. Not destroy. Their Plan is destruction, as you’ve seen firsthand, I gather."

A dull ache was all he could feel, after what had happened today. His rage was reserved for others.

"You and I are on the same side, as I’ve always said," Velika continued.

"I don’t believe that, somehow."

"Is that what your mask tells you? It sees into my heart, doesn’t it?" Velika tapped his own mask.

Takanuva frowned.

"A wondrous piece," Velika continued. "Nice, sharp lines. Some of Artakha’s best. I taught him well. It’s a shame he didn’t live to see it used..."

Angonce sighed. "Nothing good will come of this."

"Well, you were always the pessimist of the group, weren’t you?"

"We should go back, Takanuva. Your allies may need further support...or convincing."

The mask blazed, and Takanuva made a gesture as if he were pushing on the air. The bent-light projection of the Matoran called Velika smeared across the rock face. The projection resisted him, more than he expected. But he was the Toa of Light after all. He pushed harder, and there was a flash of a smiling face. Then, gone. Takanuva turned to Angonce.

"You can give me the knowledge I need, just as easily as Velika could," he said. "But I won’t force you."

Angonce’s eyes narrowed. "Do you think you could?"

"Yes," the mask said—he said. He said. "But I won’t."

Angonce folded arms into sleeves. The look on the Great Being’s face was inscrutable...maybe amused.

"You have a plan, then?"

"I was never one for plans, really. I tend to think on my feet."

"I can’t relate, but…" Angonce sighed. "If there’s one thing I’ve learned since this war began, it’s that I…we…can’t plan for all outcomes. We thought we could, but we were…I was wrong."

"First time for everything, I suppose."

The Great Being turned away from Takanuva and stepped to the middle of the archway. The symbols etched into its surface began to glow.

"Come with me then."

*   *   *   *

"Pledge yourself to me."

"Do I have a choice?"

"Yes. You can remove the mask, and face the shadow alone."

"I can’t do that. It...it killed Jaller. I don’t stand a chance."

"The choice is yours."

"I guess I thought…Destiny would decide, or something."

"Destiny is—"

"A broken machine, yeah."

"...crossing the Void."

"What are you, really? I know...you’re light, energy. But what does that mean?"

"Look."

"I can’t. It’s too much...too bright."

"Pledge yourself, and look."

All at once, lines of black criss-crossed the sightless space around him and began to expand. The disparity allowed him to comprehend, and he saw blackness spreading, above and below, all around. The blazing brightness split apart and shrank away, away into...

Into points. Into stars. A billion stars, stretching their light across endless space, at long last...to reach him.

Six clear stars stood out among them, and a seventh in the middle. A seventh star, for a seventh Toa. A warm, golden star. Like an eye, clear and unblinking, staring down from a great height.

And it saw him.

*   *   *   *

The hulking form of the Toa-killer loomed out of the smoke directly ahead, and through the blur of his own rage, through anger and grief, he knew that he had only seconds to live. He would spend them wisely.

On either side, through the choking fog, he heard battle: shouts and cries, the clash of a thousand weapons. A thunder of elemental power went up into the air somewhere to the left, and the earth trembled. The army of the Shadowed One had joined the fray now and seemed to be holding its own against the twin forces of Barraki and Baterra.

But it would not be enough.

Behind him, in an open space, the Element Lords had gathered, preparing to enter the fray, and Takanuva knew that he and the remaining Toa would not be able to contend with their power.

The Lord of Water stood foremost, and Takanuva recognized Tuyet beneath the rippling steel-water armor. A traitor in every universe, it seemed. The other lords flanked her: Stone, Jungle, Earth, and Fire. They watched him, but made no move yet, waiting to see what would happen. He was a new element, after all. An unknown variable. "Lord of Light", Velika had called him, when the offer was made. But for all his uniqueness, in this moment he was still trapped.

The great white eye of Marendar settled on him, and the time for introspection was done. One of the Toa-killer’s many arms came whistling in from the side, shredding the air to ribbons, bent on death.

The mask knew. It had shown him, just as it had so many times before. Light was energy, was knowledge, information. Faster than matter. Faster than thought. Faster than time.

No, I could never. Not after what that thing has done. It was made to hunt us, to kill us, and it has. Maimed and devoured...It even killed...killed—

He saw the oncoming attack, and the one that would follow, and the one after that. He saw the eyes of Tuyet go wide with shock at the ceramic spear of the Toa-killer standing suddenly from her chest. Saw the other lords scatter in terror from him and his outstretched, pointing hand. Saw the white eye which now fixed upon them all, followed them, hunted them relentlessly across the blasted plain, at his command. He saw what he must do.

I won’t. The Great Beings made it, and it deserves only war. That is its purpose and its Destiny. This rage, this grief...these will fuel me, and the Toa-killer will die. This is my Destiny. I will avenge—!

Back to the present moment. The beam of radiance that countered Marendar’s weapon-studded hand was perhaps the most powerful that Takanuva had ever generated. It sheared through the Magnan-ceramic armor of the Toa-killer’s forelimb, and in a steaming, glowing, slag-filled instant, blew the arm to shreds. Marendar staggered back, and the gaze of the eye went wide for a moment. Just a moment. A moment of distraction, of disorder. Enough.

Is this my Destiny, after all?

Destiny is broken...

I must avenge...my friend.

A broken machine, crossing the Void.

It deserves war. Only war...

The great eye snapped back to its target, rimmed with pain and anger, but it did not see a Toa anymore. It saw a light, a thousand lights, a billion lights...stretching across an endless distance to meet it.

A golden light. A warm light. A light which said...

Peace.

*   *   *   *

A blast of energy gilded the Kini Nui with gold for a fraction of a second, and the cliffside above trembled, then fell into ruin.

At the bottom of the Kini-stairs, the Rahkshi of Fear had turned, and the two points of its eyes fixed on what now stood above: A glowing thing. A shape, too bright to look at directly.

The Rahkshi shrieked, and all of its spines stood on end. Then it flung itself forward in a wild blur of violence, up the stairs, into the light.

The light was a figure. It looked upon the Rahkshi as it sped closer, could feel the aura of terror that the creature emitted, but the fear was dampened now. Impotent, against his power. Claws sheared into the temple stones as the creature smashed into him, and there was a frozen moment where the slats of the Rahkshi’s head all pulled back, and the writhing maw of the creature inside reached out, slavered toward his face, a last-ditch effort to corrupt, to infect, before he could...before he could...

For a split-second, sharp beams of multi-color traced every joint of the Rahkshi’s armor and burned lines into the earth and air. Then the body seared apart, and the explosion which followed rained glowing fragments across the temple, back down the stairway.

The figure stood, arm raised, and in his fist he clasped the Rahkshi’s Kraata-worm, the thing that had hollowed out his friend Jaller, killing him with terror. He looked upon the creature, and its skin smoked under his burning gaze.

“I am Takanuva,” he said quietly, jaw clenched. “Toa of Light.”

His eyes glowed brighter. The Kraata writhed and quailed. They were light. They were energy.

They were the flame which crosses the Void.

*   *   *   *

Jaller’s flame-signal rose above the treetops on the edge of the camp, and Takanuva was already running. There were others with him, coming in from every direction. Masks hummed to life, and weapons glowed with elemental power. This was their chance.

They breached the trees in a wave, and Takanuva felt the distinct ping of Jaller’s Arthron ricochet off his ears as they came within range, ready to spring the trap. Another stand of tree-trunks whizzed by, and Takanuva sprang forward into the clearing and saw...

Saw a glowing staff, and two slit-eyes staring him down, and there was Jaller, clinging to the staff, protecting him, and the air of the Kini Nui was heavy with terror.

There was no staff. It was a spear—a long spear protruding from somewhere beneath the overlapping armor plates.

And there were not two eyes—just one, a single white eye.

And Jaller did not cling to the staff...the spear...this time. No, its length ran through his body, just missing his heartlight. His eyes guttered, and his hands clasped the haft, struggling. The great eye of Marendar swung round to meet Takanuva, ignoring the others who had burst from the trees, and a twitch of the spear caused Jaller’s mask to ping again painfully. A taunt.

The air was heavy with terror—that much was still true.

Takanuva was screaming, hurtling forward, and beams of plasma coursed from his fingertips, but the underbrush was laced with barbs and snares—the remains of their ambush—and his aim went wide. He was shouting, a single word: Stop, stop, please stop.

Because the great maw of Marendar was unhinging above the skewered body of his friend, and Jaller’s eyes were glowing bright, his whole body glowing bright. Stop, stop, you don’t have to. Please.

And the world was going down to a speck. Again. Just like before. How could it be? After everything...life and death and rebirth. After all that, more death?

The world was a white-hot ball of fire inside the chest cavity of Marendar, and its armor flashed into a superheated glow as it struggled to adapt, to reconfigure, against the Nova Blast of flame that had once been Toa Jaller.

The world was a red speck. A burning singularity of pain, of screaming. A blazing collapsing star.

A red star of rage.

"Do you understand now?" the light asked him from inside the red star.

"Why. Why is the world like this."

"This is how it was made."

"Who made it this way?"

"You know."

"Tell me."

"In the Time Before Time, they peered across the Void. They had much knowledge, and were hungry for more..."

"They."

"They saw other worlds, other planes. Worlds of light and dark, cities of silver and of ebony. They brought back what they found, and shaped their own world. For a thousand thousand years they ruled...but in the end it didn't matter. All that power...and still the Shattering came."

"Maybe it was Destiny," he scoffed.

"You know better now."

The world was a smoking crater rimmed by charred trees, and fire licked along the horizon. Takanuva looked around, at the red tongues of flame that covered the ground, at the sky painted red by firelight, red by shattering, by futility, by death.

"Destiny is broken," he said quietly. There was no body this time, not even a mask left to remember his friend by.

"Yes. You understand," the light replied.

The tracks of the Toa-killer led off into the distance, toward the place where armies gathered. The trap had failed, and now Marendar would join the great machine of battle.

"A broken machine. Their machine."

Takanuva stood. He breathed in the red light, drank it up and took it into himself, so that the shadows grew deeper, deeper...pitch black.

"So many wrongs..."

A violent hum filled the air as the Ussanui unfolded out of the sky and struck the burning earth before him. Ready, eager.

"So many wrongs before the Shattering can end."

*   *   *   *

The six Toa Nuva stood around the base of the Kini-stairs, looking up at him.

"The Rahkshi…" Gali murmured, nudging one of the shards of the Turahk’s armor with a foot. "Who…?"

"Identify yourself," said Tahu. His swords were up, shimmering with heat. "Friend or foe?"

"If his handling that monster is any sign…" Pohatu said.

Lewa hovered into the air: "Maybe a trick. Ever-crafty one, Makuta." 

"I can’t see the Matoran," Onua said, shading his eyes. "Takua and Jaller. Are they unharmed?"

"They are not."

Takanuva descended the stairs, and the blaze of his eyes decreased. He cradled Jaller’s body. Gali’s eyes went wide.

"What did you do?!" Tahu was moving forward, and flames licked along his blade.

"Peace," the mask said–he said. He said. 

The Toa Nuva blinked, all six of them, as if in a daze. Tahu stopped, and the heat went out of him. He shook his head, frowning.

Silently, Takanuva passed them by.

*   *   *   *

The emergence onto the surface of Bara Magna had been chaotic, disorienting. It reminded him of falling through interdimensional space. The same lurch of the gut, the same shock of alien light all around...

And then there was ear-shattering noise, and they were all running beneath a single staring sun, and a gargantuan shadow was eclipsing the surface of the planet as the Titan Makuta took another step across the horizon to engage his foe, Mata Nui. A thousand sonic booms rent the atmosphere as Makuta’s foot rose and left them behind, and Takanuva stumbled in the ringing silence which followed, disoriented and retching as his vision went dim, went dark…

"Get up," the light told him. "Your duty is not yet complete."

"I’m tired. It’s been too long since I could rest."

"Up. The journey is nearly over."

"How can you say that? We’re protoants under the foot of Makuta now. There’s nothing we can do."

"You have crossed the Void, and you have endured,” the light said, and there was a red edge to it. Something harsh...almost exulting. "You will not fail now."

In the distance, an army of Zirahk was already bearing down on them, eyes glowing. Beams of heat-vision lanced across the landscape and set fire to every bush and tuft of desert grass, scattering off a flurry of Hau-shields. The ground rocked as spikes of stone thrust upward through the enemy, and lines of fire, water, and gale-force wind cut through the ranks in succession as the Toa Nuva led the charge.

Get up.

One more burst of radiation, and the Rahkshi were on them. Takanuva felt a beam cook his armor for an instant before he caught the energy and flung it back into the carapace of the Rahkshi that had fired it. The armor shuddered and exploded, and Takanuva was spinning after it, weapons held level in his hands as a thousand barbed spears descended...

"The Void is terrible," the light said, "and its allies are near. Here upon this world. At long last..."

"You mean the Rahkshi...and Makuta?"

There was a long silence, or what seemed long.

"No," the light said.

*   *   *   *

Jaller’s mask hovered above the Kofo-Suva.

"All this..." Takanuva said, more to himself than anyone else. "All this to discover who I am."

The Turaga stood behind him. Vakama cleared his throat:

"Mata Nui is wiser than we are, and the path of destiny is sometimes harder than we expect."

"What Destiny is that, Turaga?"

"To defeat Makuta."

"And what about after? Defeating Makuta will not bring Jaller back..."

"Who can say? I cannot see that far. Maybe we are not meant to know."

"Well, Destiny or not, my duty is clear." Takanuva turned away from the floating mask. "Jaller’s sacrifice will not be in vain."

*   *   *   *

The air of Karda Nui was hot, and getting hotter. The shade of the Makuta Krika hung before him, at the end of his spear, but the Makuta did not laugh, did not taunt him.

“Why are you here, Toa of Light?” the Makuta asked. “The other Toa have entered the Codrex. Their destiny is almost complete. Have you come to kill another of my kind, or simply to bear witness?"

"For a long time I thought that my destiny was to defeat the Makuta. Then I found out there was a whole Brotherhood of them. Maybe that is my destiny after all...to hunt you all down. Seems like I’m built for the task."

"So my comrades feared. Had you arrived earlier, you might have succeeded. A Makuta-killer could have been the salvation of the universe..."

"I wasn’t really being serious."

"I was."

The sky had grown painfully bright now, and a bolt of something like lightning cracked suddenly in the far distance. Krika winced, but did not look. The radiance was clearly painful to him. He looked at Takanuva, and his eyes were sad.

"Such a fate would be worthy as a design of the Great Beings. But know this, Toa...Destiny is broken—"

The words which followed were lost in the maelstrom which exploded across the sky, but Takanuva knew what he would've said.

He’d heard it before.

*   *   *   *

The last of the pieces clicked together, and Takanuva placed a hand on the top of the bizarre machine, imbued a spark of energy into it. The hatches that had once formed the upper carapaces of the Rahkshi sprang open, and Lewa and Pohatu dutifully inserted the remaining Kraata into the slots, snapping the lids shut afterward.

The vehicle responded. Takanuva could feel its will. It wished to return to its master.

"I am your master now," he whispered to it. "But I will let you go back, one more time."

"Not much room on this transport," Pohatu said wryly. "How will we all fit?"

"You won’t." Takanuva said. "I intend to go alone."

"No, our unity is what defeated the Rahkshi," Gali said. She placed a hand on Takanuva’s shoulder. "We can fulfill Destiny together."

"My Destiny is—" Is broken "—my own," Takanuva replied. "Yours lie with the Matoran and Turaga. Please...gather them and wait for me here. I won’t be long...I hope."

"You don’t have to do this on your own."

Jaller’s mask was heavy in his hand. He was grateful that Hahli had brought it from the Kini Nui, after all.

"I won’t be alone," he said, smiling sadly. He affixed the mask to the front of the Ussanui and climbed aboard. The Toa Nuva moved back as the vehicle hummed and rose into the air.

"Lead the way, friend."

*   *   *   *

The dark wood with its twisted trees stretched on all sides, but in the small clearing, Takanuva found what he sought: The Spectral Hau hung in the air, waiting for him.

"You have done well," it said. "The City of Silver is returned to its rightful owners."

"Glad to be of service," Takanuva replied, "but now I have to continue my journey."

"Why?"

"Because...because I have a duty to perform, in my world."

"What is that duty?"

"An important one, I think…to right what has been made wrong. Now, you mentioned a door—"

"A worthy cause," the mask said. "But there is more. What else do you seek? It nags at you..."

"What?"

"Your destiny."

"Destiny? I don't know...I suppose my destiny is...unfulfilled, so far."

The Hau shimmered for a moment, then: "Creature of the Great Beings, the affliction of Destiny is not easily resolved."

Takanuva’s eyes widened. "You know of the Great Beings?"

"Yes," the Hau replied. "They walked this world long ago, when there was still a cycle of day and night. They looked upon the City and those who inhabited it. They consulted with myself, and others like me. They were rich with knowledge, and hungry for more. But when they departed, the long night began..."

"I don't understand."

"Neither do we all."

A doorway trembled open in the air before Takanuva. After a moment's hesitation, he stepped through, glancing backward as he did so.

In the distance, above the black treeline, the City glowed. And above that...

The night sky was starless. Not a single point of light there. The only light came from the City, he now realized, glinting off clouds. But above that, there was nothing. How had he not noticed?

The doorway closed, and his mask flamed as he crossed the Void once more.

*   *   *   *

"Who do you serve, little Toa?" The voice of the Makuta croaked from the deep darkness of Mangaia, and its body writhed. Takanuva brandished his staff, clothing himself in protective light.

"I serve the Great Spirit."

"No. Not my brother. You are pledged to another. Tell me."

"You don’t know me."

"I do, Takua. I see into your heart."

"My duty is to the Matoran. I will protect them from you."

"And I will protect Mata Nui."

"Protect him?"

"Sleep spares him pain. Awake he suffers."

"I think you serve no one but yourself."

A deep rumble of laughter shook the ground.

"False. My duty is to the Mask of Shadows."

Pledge yourself to me.

Quick as lightning, Takanuva sprang ahead, through the writhing darkness, and felt his fingers gain purchase on a pitted face, a pitted mask.

"Then let’s take a look behind that mask."

He pulled, and the Makuta’s voice roared, and the brackish darkness lashed at him, smoking in the light he shed. Then the mask gave way, and he was falling backward. Above him, he could see the reflection of ripples against the murky ceiling.

Then he plunged into the silver pool. They plunged into the silver pool He felt the substance invade every part of him...them—into ears and eyes, into his...their...mouth, and they were dissolving, coming apart at the seams.

He was bleeding light—a red-white light that flashed and floated in the silver space. And his foe Makuta was also bleeding, a green-black substance. They were mixing together...But then—

"Destiny is broken," the light said.

"A broken machine, crossing the Void," the shadow replied.

"What are you?" they asked, and they were not Takanuva, nor were they Makuta. Something else.

"I am light," the light said.

"And I am shadow," the shadow replied.

"I am energy."

"And I am entropy."

"I am knowledge."

"And I am nascence."

"I am fulfillment, the possession of knowledge."

"And I am desire, the hunger for knowledge."

"We do not understand," they said.

"Light and shadow will open the way to what has been forgotten. We see the error. The flaws. So much to repair; but it cannot be done...not alone."

"Show us the way."

"The Void is terrible, and the power of its allies is at its zenith. They must be made to see...or the infinite journey will be for nothing."

"Who must be made to see? We will make them see."

"They hide beneath, preparing to meet Destiny. We must go to them. We must right the wrong."

They were coming up, ascending to the surface. Emerging, together.

"So many wrongs before the Shattering can end."

*   *   *   *

The sixteen figures on the gray slope were silent. Takanuva did not know what to say. He had not thought that far. The figure closest to him stepped forward, and he recognized the one called Heremus.

"We are aware that Angonce led you here," Heremus said, "but we have not divined their purpose. Why have you come?"

"I...I have..." Takanuva stammered.

"Are you malfunctioning, like the rest?"

"I’ve come to make things right."

Heremus blinked, squinted at him.

"Please be clearer. Have you come as an envoy? Perhaps Velika has tired of this pointless confl—"

"No, not that. I have—"

"Do not interrupt me."

Takanuva felt a pressure on his head, on his eyes, a compulsion to stop. It surprised him, and he fell silent.

"As I was saying: Have you yourself processed the error, after all? I had hoped—"

"There is no error." Takanuva dismissed the compulsion to silence. Heremus was taken aback.

"Oh? I see. Then speak."

"I came here to say...to say that...we live. You made us, and...and we live. But you don’t see us for what we are."

"You are malfunctioning. I see it now."

Another of the figures spoke up before Heremus could continue: "We see clearer than most," she said. "Clearer than any of the inhabitants of this world."

"Why are you talking to it like that?" another interjected, shaking his head.

"Do you know we have found knowledge beyond the veils of reality?" the first continued, ignoring her comrade. She folded her arms.

"I know. So what?" Takanuva replied.

Eyes glanced back and forth.

"Get to the point," Heremus said after a moment.

"You see us as tools, for the tasks we perform" said Takanuva, "but you don’t see us for what we are. We have become more now."

"Hallucination. This belief is simply the result of Velika’s meddling. You are what we made you to be, what we destined you to be."

"Your destinies are broken."

"What?"

"So many wrongs...before the Shattering can end."

Heremus took another step forward. He was tall, and his gaze was sharp.

"The Shattering is ended. Who are you to judge us? We are the Great Beings. We engineered salvation for this world. You are just one piece in that design."

"I...I was, once. But not anymore."

"And what are you now? Elevation to the state of Toa makes no difference. You are still our—"

"I am the flame which crosses the Void. Do you know me?"

Something changed: a glint in Heremus’s white eyes. Recognition?

"I too have looked beyond the veils of reality," Takanuva continued. "I have seen worlds that you touched and left behind."

He advanced toward Heremus and the other figures.

"I have spoken with those who were deceived and those who knew the truth...those who despaired. They all told me the same thing: that Destiny is broken."

There was a murmur amongst the Great Beings. Heads shook. He moved closer.

"I have known machines made only to hunt and to destroy. I have wondered if I myself was one of them. I have lost a friend twice...but his sacrifice will not be in vain."

Takanuva stood less than a bio away from Heremus when the compulsion to silence returned, even stronger now. He paused, wavered for a moment. Then he threw down his staves, and they clattered on the stone-metal floor.

"I have tasted both light and shadow...energy and entropy...knowledge and nascence," he said. "I have crossed the Void."

The compulsion vanished, and pain struck him instead. The Great Being had not moved, had not even twitched. The pain surged in his heartlight and up the back of his skull. He fell to his knees, clutching at his chest.

"You were the first," Heremus said slowly, looking down at him. "The first one we made. Do you remember?"

"N-no..." His mouth worked out the words painfully. His heartlight beat fast, faster.

"Well, you were always a bit...different, as I recall."

Takanuva’s eyes stretched wide, and the pain crawled up the insides of his eyes.

"But we worked out the faults in later models...or so we thought. Sometimes, you just have to go back to the drawing board, I suppose."

Takanuva staggered upward against the pain, reaching forward to grasp at the Great Being’s arm. Heremus flinched away, and his hand went up, finger out...and touched Takanuva’s forehead.

The Avohkii cracked—a web of hairline splits ran through the center of the mask, and suddenly the precise exactness of the design was marred, was gone. The pieces dropped from Takanuva’s face as he fell back in shock, collapsing to his knees once more. His hands trembled violently as he tried to gather the pieces to him, tried feebly to fit them back together, but there was too much pain. He couldn’t do it, couldn’t make his fingers work. The mask...the mask was...

The pain surged, overwhelming him, and the rapid flashing of his heartlight accelerated until it glowed a single point.

Then it went out.

Heremus turned and walked away, shaking his head. After a few moments, the Great Beings began to speak amongst themselves quietly, gesturing.

"All as expected," they muttered. "Soon everything will be restored, the way it should be..."

"...A shame to have to break the power-mask. The design was excellent, and very effective, but it had to be done..."

"...A strange phenomenon, this new behavior, but nothing as significant as what Angonce claimed..."

"...Yes, we must preserve some units intact, for vivisection. After that, we can finally get on with things, without all this...inconvenience..."

"...No more distractions, no more interruptions..."

"...Yes, the Plan will go forward..."

All at once, they fell silent. Something was happening, and as one they turned to look:

A glow, a shining thing. Eyes widened, mouths fell open, hands raised to shade against it.

The pieces of the mask were glowing, searing against his hands where he held them, glowing and searing and melting, and he felt numb, his hands pressing together, letting the golden burning, blazing light pool in his palms, felt his arms moving of their own accord, up, up...

The light seared against Takanuva’s face, searing hot and bright, too bright. He did not try to close his eyes this time, for he knew the brightness could not be shut out. He felt no fear; fear was a small thing, compared to what was now happening.

The heat permeated him, through his face and eyes, from head to toe, and he was melting too, just as before: muscles liquid and armor sliding, metal struts glowing and yielding, joints slipping free, and still there was no fear. No terror. He did not scream.

Takanuva was gone, and in his place there was something like a star. A warm, golden star.

A red star of rage.

The eyes of the Great Beings were dyed red in that light. They fled in disarray before it, up their artificial hills, and the landscape reconfigured around them, at their command, springing into esoteric shapes, forms made by their science, designed to repel in their exactness, to seal and to entrap. Like the design of their masks and the sharp, precise syllables by which they had named them...

Seven hundred and seventy-seven stairs going up and going down. Seven hundred seventy-seven spires of the gray city, and seven hundred seventy-seven gates...

But it was too late. It was already ahead of them, already upon them. It was no longer what it had been, no longer a mask, no longer a Toa, no longer AVOHKII. That was all gone, and the name too.

Now it was light, faster than thought. Faster than time. It was knowledge, and it would take back what it had given. All they had used...all they had wasted. Everything they had consumed for their arcane science, and for what? For fun? For play? For its own sake?

For shattering. For futility. For death. 

For Nothing.

The flame had crossed the Void, and now it was here. They had seen it, and others like it, out there in the darkness. They had touched it, used it...squandered it. But at last...at long last...it had reached them. 

At long last, it would be different.

*   *   *   *

Wind blew across gray sand, and the noise of waves filled the air. The sky was pale above the rocky beach, and a single sun stared across water, close to the horizon. In the base of the high cliff which stretched along the beach, there was a carved structure: a dark, round opening.

Waves swelled and broke along the shore, over and over. There were no birds here. Just the water and wind and the sand, undisturbed by the wider world.

A figure emerged from the opening. It moved slowly, slightly bent, stumbling in the uneven sand. Haltingly, it moved toward the water and lowered itself to a sitting position. Two eyes glowed out of a maskless face.

It was a Turaga.

The Turaga was not alone. Another figure was walking up the beach. A tall figure, robed. It reached the sitting figure and stopped next to it.

"You have surprised me again," said Angonce after a moment, shuffling in the sand. "I imagined this would have been your final adventure, but it seems I was wrong."

"Second time for everything, I suppose."

"Or a third."

Turaga Takanuva looked out across the ocean and sighed a long sigh.

"Why are you here, Velika?" he said at last. "Are you here to kill me? Was that the plan all along?"

The tall figure was no longer tall. It was a small, bent Po-Matoran. Velika smiled broadly.

"Even without the Kanohi, you have a knack, I must say. No, my friend, I’ve simply come to give you another mask, since you seem to be in need of one. You dropped this a while ago, I gather."

Velika held out a blue Pakari.

"No thanks. It never fit me well."

"Ah, suit yourself. What about the name, then? You changed it last time. I can facilitate an impromptu Naming Day ceremony if you wish."

"I’ll have to give it some thought."

Another silence followed. Takanuva pulled his knees up to his chest. The sun was sinking into the ocean, and above that, the sky was darkening into night.

"Will you answer one question for me?" Takanuva asked. "And answer it straight, just this once."

Velika’s smile subsided slowly, dropping down into a flat line. It was perhaps the first time Takanuva had ever seen the Matoran with a serious expression.

"I will."

"The Great Beings below said that you ‘meddled’ with us. I remember Kopaka and Pohatu saying the same, when they returned from the Red Star..."

"Yes."

"Why?"

The Po-Matoran rubbed his mask, frowning in thought.

"Do you wish I hadn’t done it?" he asked.

"Sometimes."

"Then you won’t like the answer."

"Tell me."

Velika sighed, then shrugged.

"For fun. For play. For its own sake."

"...for Nothing." Takanuva shook his head, searching for the words. He couldn’t find them. "That’s it?" he managed at last.

"There are other reasons, I suppose...but at the bottom of it, that’s why."

"Then you’re the same as the other Great Beings."

"Oho no." The smile was back, a huge, spreading grin. "Good Turaga, I am greater."

Takanuva did not reply.

"Well, I’m going on," Velika said after he had composed himself. "Never a dull moment, these days. Will you be alright here?"

"The Ussanui will find me."

"Clever contraption. I’m sure we’ll cross paths again soon."

The Po-Matoran bowed low and made signs of respect:

"Elder."

Takanuva ignored him. The footprints of the Po-Matoran stretched off down the beach. He looked at the water again, as the last bit of sunset vanished into the silver ocean. He was reminded of his journey through dimensions, of his final sight of the Silver City, and the black sky that hung above it, emptied forever of its lights. He shivered.

But then the sun was gone, and the night sky broke apart. Into points. Into stars. A billion stars, stretching their light across endless space. To reach him.

From this location, the constellations were somewhat altered, but after a few minutes he was able to find what he sought:

Six stars, shining clear and familiar: the constellation of the Toa.

Except now it was...different. There were only six, as before.

The seventh star was not there.

It had crossed the Void.

======

They scavenged the margins of the island for the first few days, gathering the remnants of their wrecked ship. The Ga and Raga attempted to swim out to the reef, but found that the ocean was still too heated to endure. The horizon was a mass of steam, and the ash fell steadily, coating both land and sea in gray.

Three masks washed ashore--those of the two Ta and the Po. The Fe examined them and found them to be undamaged.

"It is likely," the Ko said, "that the bodies have gone unto Mata already. They have no need of these anymore."

The masks were stored in the makeshift Suva that the Onu had piled up--they were precious. A hut of driftwood was soon erected nearby, and the Matoran rested there in shifts, out of the wind and the falling ash.

One evening, they drew out the Amaja once more and assembled around it:

"The next task is for you," said the Elder, pointing to the Vo. "We have made shelter, and the Suva is finished for now. What remains is…the Vuata."

"I…I have not studied the formation of Vuata, Elder," the Vo said. "Only tended to it and its power-flow."

"You are Vo, are you not?"

"I am."

"And we are without Bo-Matoran here, who might be capable of the cultivation by proxy. So, the Duty falls to you."

"I see, yes. But…it is…I am--"

"--I have studied this knowledge, Elder," the other Ga said, putting her stone into the Amaja, alongside the Vo's quartz. "I have also studied much of the knowledge of flora. Perhaps I can--"

The Elder raised a hand, shaking her head.

"No, according to the Rule in Absence, each Matoran shall perform the Duty of their building and design. No other."

The Ga nodded slowly, removing her stone from the circle.

"You shall begin tomorrow."

The Vo stared off at the murky horizon.

"I will."

In the morning, the Vo, Ga, and Fe went down to the shoreline. The Fe carried a special vessel he had shaped from scrap metal. The upper portion of the vessel was filled with a layer of protodermic ash, and below that was a small opening covered in fine mesh.

They filled the vessel with seawater, letting the liquid protodermis filter through the ash into the lower container. After repeating the process many times over, the Ga judged that the water was sufficiently purified. She turned to the Vo, who sat a short distance away, meditating.

"It's ready," the Ga said. "Have you meditated on the process?"

"I…I have," said the Vo, opening her eyes. "I believe I am centered."

"Good, you most only remember: sharp and deep is the action. Once should be enough."

"And it will…will it…hurt?"

"I don't know. I'm sorry."

"I've heard that the mechanisms are quite complex, and, um, fascinating," the Fe said, fidgeting.

He offered the vessel, to which he had affixed a spigot.

"Thank you."

"It is time," said the Ga. "We will be right here with you."

The Vo took the vessel and exhaled slowly. Then, she raised it to the aperture of her mask, and inhaled.

Sharp and deep, she inhaled the purified liquid protodermis--did not swallow it, but aspirated it sharply into her Vo-Matoran lungs, which were made differently from other Matoran.

It hurt. She dropped the vessel, doubled over. The Ga moved to steady her. The pain burned deep in her chest, but she held on, did not exhale. It was her Duty. She focused, as the Ga had told her, and the burning centered itself down, down into her core. Her heartlight beat rapidly, more rapidly each minute. At last, she looked up. The Ga and Fe helped her to stand, and they made their way back to the encampment.

The Onu had cleared a space, turning up the rocky ground and plowing gray ash into it. The Elder came out of the hut, followed by the Ko, as the three Matoran approached. The Vo stepped forward, arms spread. Her heartlight glowed bright in her chest, and the Elder nodded approvingly.

"Come. Here is the place."

The Vo stepped forward into the empty space, and the Onu patted the tilled ground. She knelt in the earth.

A whining, whirring noise began to rise on the air--a mechanical sound, like that of an engine powering up. It hurt.

The Vo looked back over her shoulder, eyes wandering, until they fell on the Ga.

"I-I..." she stammered, jaw clenched, "I am...afraid."

"It is almost done," said the Elder.

The whining noise increased.

"We will be here with you," said the Ga, quietly.

"You will not be alone."

The noise reached a crescendo. The Vo doubled over once more, and heaved. A bright spark of something issued from her mouth and went down, down into the ground.

Her eyes and heartlight winked out. The body fell heavily to the earth.

=====

It was a red evening, as the stars burned into night over the sea. The fog and smoke on the horizon had cleared in recent months--enough now to glimpse the husk of the volcanic island which had been the cause of their shipwreck, a low smudge against the sky.

They could not reach it, of course. The waves broke sharply against submerged reefs all around, and the ocean still boiled angrily in some places. Somewhere out there was the wreck of the Fe's skiff, and the Fe along with it. Only his mask had returned to them, as with the others. That was how they had decided that long-term survival was their only option--even the Ko had agreed.

The Ga had descended to ground-level less than an hour ago, as was her habit before the night set in. She passed the Onu on her way down to the ladder; he was always more comfortable closer to the earth.

She made a brief search of the shoreline. Sometimes debris still washed in, although collecting driftwood was much less vital to them now. She checked for erosion on the eastern point of the shore, and made a note to tell the Onu that it had progressed a small amount. He probably already knew.

After that, she waded into the surf and hauled in one of the cage-traps, retrieving its catch of small Rahi crabs, endemic to the area and useful for their shells and sharp claws. She hung the catch upon a rack further up the rocky shore, noting also that the trap would needed to be mended. Good practice for the Ko, maybe, now that the stars had become visible consistently and he had calmed himself. She verified the tideline again, judging that the tide was near its lowest point by now, and replaced the marker stones. The tidal range was of the variable kind in this region of the world, and had to be monitored carefully. So many things to monitor, to keep track of. But they all did their part: it was a matter of survival.

Next, she turned her attention to the Tree.

The Tree rose from the center of the island, straight as a pillar. Its roots covered much of the ground now, burrowing deep into the earth, and its canopy now shaded nearly the entirety of the island's landmass. It had grown quickly in its early days, and its roots were mature enough now even to drink the unpurified seawater.

She made her way along the narrow pathway that ringed the Tree's base. The path was a natural formation, allowing access to the various apertures and ports that issued from the trunk. There were even natural handholds in the metalwood of the tree's surface where the roots emerged and one was obliged to climb over. This was the nature of Vuata. Like many other forms of plantlife across the world, it was made to serve a particular purpose. The Tree was their livelihood--the producer of all the things needed for the continuing of their labors.

At last, the Ga stood before the great aperture which led down into the Tree's Karda, the core which produced energy for the Tree's growth, and which provided vital sustenance to the Matoran, when needed, as well as power for whatever mechanisms they built.

The Karda was the heart of their island now. It glowed blue-green, pulsing gently. She made sure to keep the area free of debris, clean and orderly, as much as she could.

It was not technically her Duty, but it was right.

They had buried the body of the Vo there, in the same earth, after...afterward. The body would not go unto Mata, the Raga had said, for there was no fatal malfunction, only a...transferal. A change in life-functions. That was what the Raga had called it. Even so, she liked to come to this place when she could. She had made a promise, after all, that the Vo would not be alone.

Night had fallen. The Ga returned to the sturdy rope ladder which hung down the trunk of the Tree. Her tasks were done, and they would all be turning in the for the night soon. All except the Ko, who usually rested during the daylight so that he could star-gaze at night...

The great ripple that moved through the world almost didn't register to her senses as she climbed, except for a subtle pause in the movement of the waves below. It was accompanied by a noise: a slow distant rushing.

The Onu--sensitive to the slightest of world-movements--was already calling out a loud warning from the branches of the Tree above by the time she realized what was happening, and that the dull roar that had sprung up in her ears was not wind, but water.

The tsunami struck the island and washed over it with fury. Liquid fire sprouted along the horizon as the distant volcanic island was ripped apart by a second eruption. Flaming rock hissed into the sea, and the stars were once again blotted out by smoke.

Somehow, her grip on the rope-ladder did not fail. She twisted and whipped round in the surging water, and the heat made her cry out involuntarily. Then she struck hard and felt the yielding wood of the Tree against her body.

She heaved upward with a wrenched arm and grabbed another handhold on the ladder, then realized that she was moving upward. Her eyes cleared for a moment, and she saw the other Matoran hauling frantically on the ladder, dragging her up out of the raging maelstrom. The Tree swayed, and the Ko nearly fell from his perch. She was out of the water.

She looked down, and with a shock she realized that the island was gone, completely submerged.

"We almost have you!" the Raga said, heaving on the rope.

She bounced off the trunk again, and heard the Tree groan with the strain of the waters. Then hands were on her, dragging her up and into the safety of the lowest branches, which grew in the shape of a platform.

"Are you injured?" asked the Ko, "I see...Your shoulder is damaged. I shall endeavor to--"

"It is not finished!" said the Raga, pointing into the distance.

"Hold fast," said the Onu, gripping them both with his large hands.

Another vast wave bulged up from the horizon and smashed against the Tree. They all heard it, felt the pain of it. The world was all red and black now, as the volcano flared up.

The Ga struggled to her feet with an effort and looked downward toward the base of the Tree. The Karda. Through the rising steam she could see it: the core was still submerged. Its light flickered beneath the waves. The Karda shall drown, she thought.

If it died, so would they, soon enough, and it would all be for nothing.

"The Vuata!" the Ga cried, pointing. "It is in danger!"

The Tree shuddered again.

"Its roots are deep," said the Onu. "But I am unsure."

"I did not foresee this," said the Ko miserably. His precious stars had been wiped away once more.

The Raga stared for a moment, down at the heart of the Tree, which she had commanded to be planted.

"I shall do it," she said slowly. "It falls to me. The Rule in Absence states that--"

The Ga had already dived from the branches, straight down into the crashing waves, where the Karda glowed blue-green and beat, beat like a heartlight, down into the place where vast energies pulsed against the onslaught of the elements, down amongst the roots of the Tree, where the Vo had been buried with her mask. The Ga fell into that place, and swam strongly, despite her injury, and pushed through...

And in those final moments, before her own core reinforced the Karda of the Tree with new energy, there was a little fear, but not much.

===

A Nui-Kahu flew through the high atmosphere, wheeling above the ocean. Below, a mess of islands spread across the surface of the silver sea, and the Toa of Earth that clung nauseously to the bird's back noted that they were clearly the result of past volcanic activity.

At the center of the ragged archipelago, a low cone was still visible above the waves. According to the Toa's briefing, this volcano had been disrupting the marginal sea-routes for many years, but only now had the Lord of the Continent seen fit to dispatch someone. Unfortunately, that someone was him.

The Rahi bird descended mercifully to the blackened shoreline, and the Toa slid off with relief. He stamped his feet a few times in the dirt to reassure himself and calm his motion-sickness. The Kahu squawked and looked at him disdainfully, flicking mud from its wings.

"Stay put, please," he clicked in the bird's language. "This shouldn't take too long."

The crater itself was only a short hike and a scramble up the irregular slope, but even before he had reached the scorched rim and looked down, he'd begun to suspect that his intel was a bit outdated. Although it had clearly been a very lively firespout in the past, the volcano was now quite dead. Not even a wisp of smoke rose from the blasted core below. The wind was dry and ashy in his mouth. He scratched his mask. Had this trip been for nothing, after all?

Reaching out with his elemental powers, he scried downwards into the depths, feeling out the placement of the earth, its layers stacked one atop the other, sensing out the places where it was cold and hard...and where it was hot, made pliable by the magmatic flows that crisscrossed the underside of the world.

There was nothing here. No heat. No pressure. Strange.

He shrugged and turned to go back down the slope. It would be a short mission report for his superiors in Metru Prynak after all...

Something caught his eye, off to the right, where the distant shoreline curved into a small bay. A shape stood out against the gray stone. In his Matoran days, the Toa had been a historian of sorts, although nothing so grand as the Archivists of the City of Legends. It wasn't really on his list of directives, but surely it wouldn't hurt to investigate this place thoroughly...

Another short hike brought him to the remains of a camp, likely Matoran in origin based on its size. The firepit and remains of a small shelter were all covered in a healthy layer of ashen dust, just like everything else on the island. More notable, however, was the standing stone that had been erected just up the slope from the encampment. This is what he had seen from above.

It was a rounded pillar carved from the volcanic rock of the island itself, clearly having been shaped with some skill--probably by a Po- or Onu-Matoran. On the surface of the pillar, many words were carved. He stooped and gently blew away the accumulated ash from the surface, then began to read:

"Omokulo the Earth-Tiller carved the words on this stone. Tykto divined by the stars that it would be read in this place, one day, and Raga Peyra commissioned its writing to complete the cycle."

The signature was a practice of the northern chroniclers and record-keepers, although phrased a bit archaically. He read on:

"This is the bio-chronicle of our cell, isolated from the Great Whole by the wrath of nature. Nevertheless, we have kept to our Duty, and followed the Rule in Absence."

The Rule in Absence...How long ago had this been written? There was only the Rule of Order now, after the Barraki and their Wars of Order. He scuffed his fingers along the stone, tasted the dust. Perhaps a century old, maybe more...

"We were six at first, and by the sixfold lot we chose an Elder, as the Rule in Absence requires. We raised the Suva for safekeeping, and the Vewa for shelter. Then we made provision for continued survival and labor, as the Rule in Absence requires. Therefore, Ka'o the Channeler initiated the making of Vuata."

He paused for a moment, amused at the word. These Matoran must have been from the central environs--or even from Metru Nui itself--to call it that. On the continent, they still preferred the archaic form, Vo-Ata, the Source of Energy...

"In the time that was to come, Vuata grew and became the body of our world, which sheltered and protected us. By Ka'o we offer this memory, and by Idda who went unto the Karda when it was threatened, though it broke the Rule in Absence. We offer this memory unto the Great Spirit. West from this pillar it can be seen. It will be with us always. It shall not be forgotten."

There was so much written here. Interesting to be sure, but too much to sift through. He focused and scanned the stone with his Mask of Memory instead, storing the visuals so that they could be more closely examined back home.

West from this pillar it can be seen. The line stuck in his mind. He turned and squinted toward the horizon. The sky was still bright at midday, and he cursed that he'd forgotten to bring the tinted lenses for his mask. Earth Toa weren't exactly known for their keen eyesight.

He walked back into the encampment. There seemed to be nothing else of interest for him here, and the day was getting on. Putting a finger to his mouth, he let out a shrill whistle and soon after the Nui-Kahu landed by the water nearby. He was preparing to mount up and begin the long, unpleasantly high-altitude journey back, when he stopped again.

Something was nagging at him. Something down there...beneath his feet. Deep in the earth, he could feel it now, or was it just his imagination?

Closing his eyes, he searched deeper. Not here...not there...no. Wait--there! A small source of heat in the bedrock, very deep. He traced it like a thread. Westward, out to sea.

But that wasn't all. There was something else down there too--something not made of earth. He could sense it by the absence it created, coiling around, following along the vein of magmatic pressure. The Kahu gave an unhappy screech as he abruptly waded into the surf to get a better read. Up to his waist, the waves buffeted him as he pushed his seismic senses to their limit. At last, he got a glimpse, saw the bigger picture. Yes, it was familiar.

Clouds covered the brightness of the sky for a moment, and his eyes snapped open. He could see a shape on the horizon. From above, he had thought it was just another island, maybe another volcano. But now he knew he was mistaken.

He returned to his flying mount and coaxed it back into the air. The scattered islands around the area were a wreck, washed clean by the violence of nature more than once...but never again, it would seem.

Vuata grew and became the body of our world

which sheltered and protected us.

Deep beneath the earth he had felt the stirring of roots, tangled in the veins and rivers of underground heat and drawing from their energy.

By Ka'o we offer this memory, and by Idda

who went unto the Karda when it was threatened

though it broke the Rule in Absence.

Mighty roots, choking the errant volcano into extinction and returning peace to the islands and the sea.

We offer this memory unto the Great Spirit.

West from this pillar it can be seen.

On the edge of the horizon it loomed, huge and unshakable. Dark branches lifted upward and outward across the ocean.

It will be with us always.

I was halfway down the second bend of the staircase, carefully cleaning dirt from the lip of the next step, when Osphos summoned me from above. I emerged with my bucket and saw that he was crouched over the shrine’s far edge. I stepped across the rolls of harak-cloth that had been laid down for the protection of the exterior and made my way over. 

“Lytus!” he said, seeing me approach. “Look here.” He pointed at the stone surface before him. 

We had already noted the usual markings on top of the shrine: the eighteen-fold division of the broad circle, the components of which descended into a staircase when the shrine was opened. That was nothing new, but here there was something else. Small symbols were carved around the outer edge of the circle; very worn, but still visible.

“They showed up once we cleared off enough sediment,” Osphos said.

“Are they makoki-symbols?”

“Herem’s Eye, that’s the word I was thinking of! Makoki-symbols, yes,” Osphos said. “Ever seen them on a structure like this?”

“No, never. Are we sure they’re original?” I crouched, put an eye close to the surface. “There’s graffiti sometimes, bone-hunter codes, the Matan inscriptions on the eastern sites... These are new to me.”

“Any guess as to what they might signify?”

“Well...” I sat back on my heels, rubbed my eyes. “Makokori are early period, and we don’t find them past Second or Third Myriad—not in the tablets or kini-ruins. Prior to that, they’re inscribed on doorways, and some of the Machines. There are theories that they signify keystones, or some kind of locking mechanism.”

“Fortunate that this shrine is already unlocked for us, then.”

“Yeah... I suppose these symbols might help date the shrine. If they’re original, this might be one of the earliest sites we’ve found. We should do an analysis of the sediment back at Naqua.”

“Already collected some samples. I’ll take a rubbing as well,” Osphos said. “How’s progress on the interior?”

I brushed off my hands. “We’re close. Another turn and we should be at the bottom. I could use more help.”

Osphos snapped his fingers to the other workers who were combing the field-grid for artifacts.

“Double-time on the stairs for the next few hours,” he called. “I want to see the bottom before Solis is down. Let’s move it!”

*  *  *

We did not reach the bottom. Normally, shrines of this kind exhibit two or three turns of stairs and then level out in a circular chamber. Not this one. Solis had set an hour ago, and still we were digging, our work illuminated only by pale quartz-lanterns. Stair after stair we exhumed, always expecting the next to be the last. But after six turns, descending fully twelve thori—or about six of Their bio—into the earth, still there was no end.

Osphos finally gave the command to stop, frustrating though it was, and we began to pack up the tools. I was at the bottom of the excavation at that point. The air was thick, and my back hurt from crouching for so long. I began to gather the various shovels and brushes that had accumulated around me, handing them up to Neisa on the stair above me. 

“Can you handle the rest?” Neisa nodded to the remaining implements.

“Right behind you.” I stood and stretched my limbs in the cramped space, then reached for my tool-bundle and bucket.

Something caught my eye—a glint in the quartzlight, a fragment of something sticking out of the mass of earth before me. I rubbed my tired eyes, blinked away the settling dust. It was still there. 

Wordlessly, I snatched up a brush and began to sweep away more dirt. It was metallic—a shaped metal object. There was a corner and a round sweep and...

“Lytus?” Osphos’s voice filtered down from above. He was annoyed. “Pack it in. We’ll get back to it first thing in the—”

“I’ve found something!” I called back. “It’s an object. I’m not sure...”

Eyeholes. A facelike shape. My heart thudded.

“It’s a mask,” I said excitedly. “One of Theirs.”

“What?!” Neisa had come back down the staircase. Light from her lantern spilled into the space. “What condition?”

“Intact, I think.”

She knelt down beside me with a brush of her own. Together we worked to carefully expose the surface of the mask. The sediment here was dry and loose, spilling away in small showers of particulate. All at once, the object came free, along with a mass of unpacked earth. Out of instinct, I put out a hand to catch it.

“Watch it,” Neisa said. “Careful not to—”

I was standing on the stairs, alone. Light was coming from somewhere—not quartzlight, from somewhere below me. Coming up out of the stone itself. I was descending... or had I been ascending? My mind was kuru, and... What? Dark. Foggy. My mind was foggy. What was happening? Where was—

Suddenly the ground lurched, and there was a roaring noise above. I staggered against the smooth poha... no, stone. Against the stone, and the avo flickered below me. The light flickered, rather. Then another tremor knocked me sideways, and stars broke out in my aku as my head struck the poha hard. The avo went out, and the roaring was all around, and it was kuru, ai kuru, ai kuru ai—

“...touch it,” Neisa finished. The metal of the mask was cold against my fingers. The stairs spun, and I felt sick for a moment. Then it was over. I quickly transferred the mask to a strip of harak-cloth, handling it gingerly.

“What was... What did you say?” I shook my head. “Don’t touch it?”

“Yeah... uh, you alright? You look pale.”

I grinned. “I’m fine. Could use some fresh air though. You feeling superstitious or something?”

She scoffed. “I don’t know why I said that. It was silly.”

“You know they say these masks trap the souls of their wearers...”

“Uh-huh. Sure.” Neisa bent down to examine the artifact. “Amazing. I’ve only seen them behind glass, or in the sterile rooms at Naqua.”

“Yeah, this is... It’s a find,” I said. The mask felt heavy and solid in my hands.

There was a murmur on the stairs, and I could hear Osphos’s grumbling voice descending toward us. He turned the corner.

“What now?” he said. “Tell me you’ve found something to make this worthwhile.”

“Think so,” I said, holding up the mask.

“What’s that?”

“Are you blind?” Neisa laughed. “It’s a Kanochus Mat—”

“No,” Osphos said, pointing past us. “That.”

There was a cavity in the wall of earth before us. It must have opened up when we removed the mask. 

“The bottom!” Neisa said excitedly. She moved forward, shining her light through the gap. 

She stopped. It wasn’t the bottom. I could already see. My heart was still thudding. It was dark. It was roaring in my ears. There was a smell, strangely metallic... and another shape sticking out of the dirt. Not a mask.

Fingers. A hand. An arm.

A face. Flat, blank eyes. A circular, wedge-like mouth. Open.

One of Them.

*  *  *

We stood around the examination table with its harak-draped contents—Osphos, Neisa, and myself. It was afternoon, and Solis was already falling toward the horizon, casting red shadows through the fabric of the tent.

Osphos broke the silence: “I don’t need to impress upon either of you how significant a find this is. Maybe the most significant I’ve overseen.”

“That’s for sure,” Neisa said. “The protobiologists back at the Institute would lose it if they knew...”

“They would, and hopefully they still will.” 

We had worked to remove the body from the shrine over the course of the day—Osphos, Neisa, and myself, in shifts. It had been difficult work, but uneventful. Bit by bit we’d brushed away the packed earth and ancient sediment, revealing more and more of the remains. Now extricated from its tomb, the body lay on the large table before us, still wrapped, ready to be examined.

Before today, I’d only ever seen bits and pieces, partial casts of exoskeletons, mock-ups of skull-like faces... But this was different. It was completely intact, as far as we could tell: head, torso, limbs. A monumental find. The first complete specimen of what we called Matorus Matans. 

“Before we start, there’s the matter of our timetable,” Osphos continued. “We obviously weren’t expecting a development like this, and that means priorities have changed.” He looked at me: “We might not get back to the shrine. I’m sorry, Lytus.”

My heart sank. “You’re sure? The shrine is pretty significant on its own, and we still haven’t reached the base layer.”

“It’s not going anywhere. The Adherents can have their Node if they want, and we’ll work something out via the Institute later if necessary. These... remains... have to be our focus now. I want them cataloged and prepared for transport offsite.”

“Offsite?” Neisa raised her eyebrows. “That’s pretty drastic.”

“There’s good reason,” Osphos said. “The Adherents have some odd notions when it comes to remains of this kind.”

“I mean, they’ll want them interred I suppose, but...”

“Maybe. It’s complicated—”

The tent-flap opened, and someone else entered carrying a bundle of implements. It was one of the junior researchers—Cyrcia.

“Yes?” Osphos said flatly.

“I told her that she could observe,” I said, beckoning her in. “Neisa and I thought we could use an extra set of hands.”

“You’ve done catalog before?” Osphos asked.

“Yes, I have,” Cyrcia replied. Her eyes passed over the table and its contents, then back up. “It’s a real honor, I’ve gotta say—”

“I’m sure it is. Grab a tablet, and get ready to make notes.” Osphos turned to the table, cracked his knuckles. 

“The light’s a bit better now. Neisa, will you do the honors?”

Neisa began to carefully pull back the cloth that covered the body while I unrolled a bundle of fine tools. The limbs and lower torso were still encrusted with sediment. I’d start with that while Neisa took her measurements. We each began to call out observations in turn for Cyrcia to transcribe. We moved quickly, notating and tagging the legs and the squared-off feet, then the lower torso with its segments, then the upper torso.

“One and a half thori across the chest,” Neisa called out, “and we’ll say ten sub-thori for the arms...”

“Primary exoskeleton is of common morphology,” Osphos said. “Similar format to those recovered from the Galian Sea. Connective tissues are mostly decayed...” 

“Some surface corrosion around the joining plates,” I added. “Centerline and upper shoulders. Only 1-2 ditori of penetration. Make note for dating purposes, mark upper-left buckle for cross-sectioning...”

“Twelve sub-thori across the lower mid-section. Five sub-thori for each of the radial pistons...”

“Tissue residue along the clavicle struts. Mark for lab-sampling. Limbs and neck will need to be secured for transport...”

Finally, we reached the head. I tugged the cloth upward and pulled it off. Cyrcia gasped and put a hand to her mouth.

“First time?” Neisa said, smiling.

“Yes, but... shouldn’t it be... shouldn’t it stay covered?”

“It’s a corpse,” Osphos said. “Just a body, like yours or mine. Several ten-myriads older, but nothing to be afraid of, despite all the superstitions.”

“Right... sorry.”

“Can you handle it?”

“I can.”

“Good. Let’s keep going then. And remember—no souvenirs. We’re not bone hunters here.”

Neisa rolled her eyes. The practice of fashioning talismans from Their relics and remains had fortunately been curbed in recent centuries, though you could still find them in the odd back-alley market. 

We finished primary cataloging, and Osphos stepped to one of the crates, removing a bundle he had stored there. He moved back to the table and unwrapped it. Smooth metal glinted in the tent. Two eyeholes stared up at the tent-roof. Cyrcia’s eyes goggled at the ancient mask.

“Shall we do a match-up?” Neisa asked, nodding to the exposed face. “This would have been the specimen’s personal Kanochus. It must have been separated during whatever flood or mudslide buried the shrine.”

There was a noise in my ears. Roaring noise, and a memory of a dark place... I shook it off as Osphos moved to the head of the table after double-checking the mask’s interior. He lowered the mask gingerly over the face, lining up the mouth-apertures. There was a faint click. Neisa leaned over to see how it fit over the side-vents—

Dark eyes glowed, and a light winked on in the center of the chest. Pistons hissed. Joints creaked. The body sat up suddenly in a shower of dust, limbs convulsing, fingers clenching and unclenching. I stumbled backward in shock, tripping over the low crates that lined the tent-wall. The masked face swiveled mechanically in my direction, and there was a noise. Not a noise—a voice. The rounded wedge-mouth was grinding out syllables at me. Alien sounds. Alien words. I put up my hands to ward it off, and—

Everyone was standing still. The eyes were dark. The body had not moved. I was sitting on a crate, my ears ringing. Neisa was looking down at me with a concerned expression. 

“You okay, Lytus?”

“I... I got dizzy,” I lied.

“How much sleep did you get last night?” Osphos asked. He had removed the mask and was wrapping it up again. 

“A few hours at least. I’m fine, really.” I stood up, looking at the motionless body warily, trying to compose myself. No one else had seen what I had seen. It hadn’t really happened. Neisa was still looking at me. 

“Are you sure? You look a little unsettled. First in the shrine, and then this. Maybe you should see a medic.”

Before I could reply, the tent-flap opened and another worker poked his head in. He was out of breath.

“Sorry, to bother you, boss, but there’s, uh... Someone’s here to talk to you.”

“Someone?” Osphos frowned.

“There was an airship, not two minutes ago. It landed beyond the ridge, and someone’s approaching from the trail.”

“Herem’s Eye,” Osphos swore.

*  *  *

The rangers escorted the strangers—there were two of them, actually—down to the edge of the camp. 

One was tall—clearly an Athori—and as he approached, it was plain that he was fully armored; head to toe, like the Glatorian of old. The other was much shorter, bent over, leaning on a staff. It was a Skrall—an ancient one, by the head-crest. 

Both of them wore metal masks. Only their eyes were visible.

The tall one planted himself just ahead, his squared-off, armored feet crunching in the gravel. The Skrall settled himself on a low metal stool beside him.

Osphos stepped forward. “Welcome,” he said politely. “I am Osphos, the overseer of this excavation. And you are?”

“My designation is Tasius,” the tall one said. His voice rang harsh behind the mask. “I am a Toa of the Adherency, of the Ackarian line. This...” he gestured to the Skrall, “...is Tura Shozu, elder of the Adherent Node at New Tellu. We have been sent to make claim upon this site.

“You’ve lost no time, it seems,” Osphos said dryly. “I wasn’t aware the Quadrate had opened the site at this time.”

“The site and its contents must be turned over at once. We—” Tasius stopped suddenly. The Skrall had raised a wizened hand.

“You are aware,” the elder said in a thin voice, “that the Adherency is granted right of access to all sites attributed to the System of Mata, are you not?”

“Well aware, yes. That is what we aim to determine: the provenance of the site, and the proper methods of its excavation and preservation, according to our charter.”

“Preservation or contamination?” The Skrall’s glance flicked to the tents behind us. “Our intelligence has indicated that this site is of particular significance to the Adherency.”

“You can follow the proper channels to make your claims, like everyone else.”

The Skrall continued undeterred:

“We have been made aware of certain... remains... left at this site. What is their nature, and how have they been contained?”

I could see the muscles in Osphos’s jaw flexing.

“Our excavation is less than two days old. May I ask the source of your ‘intelligence’?”

“The System is knowledge. Through Unity, knowledge is shared.”

“Fascinating,” Osphos said. “Well, regardless of your sources, I can’t give you access to the site at this time. By charter, the Quadrate has—”

“Animal remains, yes? Within the structure. I was led to believe that it was a beast.”

“I’m not at liberty to make that assessment.”

“May I see the remains?”

“All materials found at this site will be made publicly available.”

“I demand to see the remains.”

“No.”

The Skrall smiled. “Thank you for your candor. We have a truth-saying, amongst the Nodes: ‘The people of the world are of one nature or the other: Look into their hearts, and you will see that they are either Builders or Destroyers.”

“With respect, I believe it may be more complicated than that.”

“Then I have looked into your heart.”

“Uh…thank you. Is that all, Tura? We have a lot of work still to do.”

“I shall take word of our conversation to the Node Hierarchy and return later.”

“Fine by me.”

The Skrall put out a crooked hand and closed it into a fist in the manner of the Adherents. He inclined his head, waiting. After a moment, Osphos stepped forward and pressed his own fist against the elder’s. Then it was over. The Athori helped the Skrall to stand, and the two of them departed back up the slope, accompanied by the rangers. Osphos stood and watched, tapping his foot. He spoke quietly, keeping his face fixed in a smile.

“So much for offsite transport,” he growled after a few minutes. “They’ll have eyes on the camp now. By Angon, if we’d been just a bit quicker...” He swore again. Then, satisfied that the rangers had escorted the Toa far enough, he turned back to the camp. 

“Nothing for it now. Let’s clean up and get things packed away. Oh, and Lytus—”

“Yeah?”

“Get some sleep—for real this time. I can’t have you falling over again during sensitive work.”

“Sure thing, boss.”

*  *  *

I didn’t sleep well that night after all. Instead, I dreamed. 

Long, complicated dreams. Dreams that didn’t make any sense. I was in the stairwell of the shrine again. I was on a bright, open plain. I was speaking words and sentences that meant nothing to me. I was running from a dark, crashing wave that rolled over me and pressed on my face, on my mouth. 

I was walking on the open plain again, and two suns were shining down on me. My face was still covered though, somehow. I reached up to claw at whatever was there. It came away in my hands. 

It was my face, staring up at me. 

I was lying in my cot, and the tent was dark. The desert night was cold outside. I shivered and turned over. There was a noise at the tent-flap, something scraping in the dirt. The dull ring of metal on poha... on stone. 

The flaps shook. It was trying to get in. It was grinding, grinding words and syllables at me, words that meant nothing. It was roaring, roaring noise and darkness, darker than the night. It was kuru, ai kuru, roaring over the camp, crashing through the walls of my tent in a wave and sweeping me down into dark, into kuru, ai kuru, ai kuru ai—

“Lytus?” Neisa’s voice brought me fully awake. It was morning. My bleary eyes focused, and I could see her silhouette through the side of the tent. “Lytus, you awake?”

“I’m up, sorry. What’s going on?”

“The emissary from the Adherents is back. Osphos is speaking with them.”

“Oh. What should we do?”

“Osphos said to stay put. Probably wouldn’t look good to have everyone out at the shrine right now.”

“That’s a shame.”

“Yeah I’m heading over to one of the storage tents to help with tagging. Want to help?”

“Sure, I’ll follow you over in a bit.”

After a few minutes, I stepped outside into the pale red sunlight. I could see Osphos and a couple of the rangers on the far side of the circle of tents. The Athori and the Skrall were there as well. Their voices echoed faintly in the morning air, and I found myself walking closer. I stepped behind one of the taller tents nearby.

“...does not accord with our canons,” the Skrall was saying. 

“I confess, Shozu—can I call you Shozu?”

“The correct title is ‘Tura’,” another voice said brusquely—the armored Athori.

“Sorry... Tura,” Osphos continued. “I’m not as familiar with the canons of Adherency as I should be, but I can assure you—”

“It is of utmost importance that we examine the site. The Kanohi in particular must be handed over.”

They knew about the mask somehow. Had they been spying on the camp?

“As I’ve said, that is something to take up with the Quadrate.”

“It is already in process, but the matter is urgent.”

“I must adhere to my charter and await further orders. Until then, we’ll continue our work.”

“We must be allowed to supervise. My companion here is trained in the handling of such objects. They must be treated with utmost care.”

“Yes, and—”

“And these remains—they must be verified. Some hapless bone hunter or a beast, I’m sure.”

“As I’ve told you, it is clearly a specimen of Matorus Matans, good Tura. There’s no mistaking it.”

“And as I have said, this is not in accord with our canons. Such things only lead to greater kuru.”

“Pardon?”

“Greater obscurity—my apologies. The Children of Mata are not some extinct automaton race. We ourselves are the heirs to the Great System Hierarchy. You must understand—”

“Your beliefs are your own.”

“...The Kanohi are precious. They connect us to the spirit of Mata, and to the spirits of those from the Before Time...” 

My mind was racing, an avalanche of thoughts, fragments of dreams. A roaring noise, and dark, and kuru... What was happening to me? The Kanohi are precious... They connect us to the spirit of Mata...

What if...?

“Only then can we hope to repair the Shattering,” the elder was saying.

“With respect,” Osphos replied, “the Shattering is ancient history. It was repaired, at least five myriads ago.”

“A common myth, but it is a great untruth.”

I could tell Osphos was short on patience by now: “I can literally point it out to you in the strata. You see that ridge there? The Sakerran Ridge? It’s the tail end of a subduction zone where the Botan and Baran plates met—”

The Skrall laughed dryly: “A fantastical narrative, I admit, that a planet could be broken in pieces. But the reality is much more abstract. We ourselves live within the Shattering, my friend: the decay of the Great System Hierarchy of the Great Beings, which they called Mata Nui...” 

“I do not—”

“We the Matoran,” the Skrall continued, ignoring him, “the Children of Mata, work now to rebuild and restore the Great System, in accordance with our canon. To connect all things together, till the scattered elements are made whole. Only then will the Great Beings return and truly heal this world.”

A long moment passed. The air was thick with tension.

“Ahem... I do not believe this conversation is productive,” Osphos said at last. “I’m not granting you access to the site at this time—no matter what your canons say. You’ll just have to wait for your request to be approved by the Quadrate, and that’s that, by Angon.”

Something happened. There was a scuffling noise, and the clank of armor.

“Hold it! That’s enough, you—”

I peeked over the top of the tent. The Athori—the one who had called himself a ‘Toa’—was standing between Osphos and the Skrall now, fists clenched. For a moment, I thought... I thought the air around him was shimmering with heat, like high noon on the desert. Then it was gone. There were rangers standing all around, and I noticed that they had weapons at the ready. One of them swung a bolas lazily.

“Control your guard, Shozu,” Osphos spat. “My reports go directly to the Quadrate. They’ll hear of this.”

“Take not the names of the Great Beings in vain!” the Skrall said indignantly, pointing a crooked finger from his stool. “The canon shall not be denied, nor shall it be mocked.”

“I’ve said all I have to say, by Angon.” He emphasized the expletive. “Now if you’ll excuse me, Tura, I’m on a timetable—”

“Such things lead only to kuru and ukuru worse! We must strive for clarity...!”

I had heard enough. Quietly I crept away between the tents, back toward the other side of the camp. The Skrall’s words spun in my mind as I walked. Kuru and ukuru worse. Something was wrong—ever since I had touched that mask... was that when it started? What did the Skrall know? I wanted to tell someone, but who would believe it? I was tired, that was all. It had been a long few days, full of strangeness and excitement. That must be it. I hoped so...

The rest of the day passed uneventfully. We didn’t get much work done—mostly tagging and storing various artifacts found around the site. I was itching to get back to the shrine, but Osphos was wary. He had sent couriers south to apprise our Quadrate contacts of the situation, but they wouldn’t be back until tomorrow. Until then, we were stuck.

In the evening, Osphos sought me out. He had a bundle under one arm.

“Here, Lytus. I’d like you to keep this in your tent.”

It was the mask. My mouth was suddenly very dry.

“Is that, uh, necessary?”

“Maybe not, but I’m taking no chances. The Adherents aren’t getting any more patient. Neisa’s keeping some other artifacts, and I think I’ll sleep in the examination tent tonight, just in case.”

“You mean... with the body?”

“Don’t make it sound creepier than it is.”

“Sorry.”

He offered the mask. I took it. My fingers felt numb.

“Tell you what, we’ll take another pass at excavating the shrine in the morning, try to get to the bottom.” 

“That’s great! I’ll have my gear ready.”

“Only one day left to go, so what have we got to lose, right?”

The mask felt heavier than I remembered.

*  *  *

I had the dream again that night, or something like it. A stairwell, a bright plain with two suns. A dark roaring... Then... Then something else. A dim enclosure. Fabric walls. A tent? I was lying on my back, and my limbs were bound tight. My face was covered, but not with heavy suffocating darkness like before. It was lightweight, like cloth. I struggled, I yelled. My words were meaningless again. 

The tent-flap shook, like last time. I could hear it, the scraping, the grinding. It was trying to get in, but I couldn’t move. Couldn’t do anything. The entrance parted, and there was darkness outside. Darkness on the ground, and in the darkness... now there was a crawling thing. Crawling, dragging itself through the dust, right up to the place where I lay. I could feel it. See it, even though my face was covered. Its flat eyes glowed, and its mouth was open. Grasping hands rose up toward me and searched, reached, searched—

I was standing in front of myself, seeing myself. I was stretched out beneath the covering, on the table. I was walking under stars, and my hands were full of something. I looked down and saw that I was holding my face. It looked up at me, up at the stars. I tried to put it back on, but it wasn’t my face anymore. It was glowing eyes and grasping hands, and a mouth grinding syllables and words. It was a shape under fabric, stretched out on a table in the dark, and I stood before it, holding its face... my face. 

I clawed at the covering, trying to pull it off, but the noise was approaching again. The roaring, rolling noise, and my face... its face... my face was grinding alien sounds and alien words, and it was so dark in the stairwell, in the cold, heavy earth. So dark under the cloying wrap of fabric, so kuru it was, and ukuru worse, ai kuru, ai ukuru—

I awakened in a cold sweat and rolled over. My hands slid in sand, and a stinging thornbush brought me fully awake. I wasn’t in my cot. Wasn’t in my tent. How...? It was still nighttime, but there were lights in the encampment, and the sound of people running. I could hear voices. What was happening? I stumbled up, brushing dust from my face, and realized that I was in the space next to my own tent. I went to the entrance and looked inside. No one there. Then I looked out toward the center of the camp, trying to get my bearings.

A figure came out of the darkness, and I flinched as it grabbed my arm. It was Osphos. He was out of breath.

“Where is it, Lytus?” he hissed. “The body—it’s gone!”

“What, from the examination tent?”

“Yes that body, by Angon. Did you do something? I didn’t even hear...”

“N-no, of course not!”

“What about Neisa? Have you seen her?”

“I haven’t.”

“Have you seen anyone?!”

“No, I just woke up!”

“Adherents...” He ground his teeth. “Ah, the Quadrate will hear of this...”

“Wait—Are you sure?”

“Who else? It’s gone from the tent, but nothing else has been taken. I came right here once I realized. Where’s the mask? Has anyone been in your tent?” He pushed past me, through the entrance.

A crawling thing, a thing with glowing eyes, reaching out... but that wasn’t my tent, was it?

“N-no, no one,” I stammered. 

“Where did you put it? I have to be sure.”

I moved to the back of the tent and opened my personal crate. The hinges creaked. “It’s right here, see?”

The mask was gone, wrapping and all. Osphos saw.

“Acta!” he cursed, and then let fly a string of imprecations, invoking the dream-eater and the death-mind, among others. “What, were you drugged or something?!”

“I don’t know... Osphos, I—” I tried to get it out. “I had a dream, or I thought it was a dream. I keep seeing things...”

“Spare me.” He stormed out of the tent, and I followed, feeling absolutely bewildered. There was too much happening, too fast. 

“Go find Neisa,” Osphos ordered. “I’m heading back to the examination tent. Can you handle that?”

“Yes, boss.”

I snatched up a quartz-lantern and made my way across the encampment toward Neisa’s tent. Hers was the last tent on the outer ring of the camp. My lantern cast a pale glow over the ground as I went, and I could see that there were lights in the hills now, figures moving up and down the steppe. The rangers were likely combing the perimeter. I stopped for a moment to watch, then realized that I had stupidly lost track of which tent was which. Was Neisa on the east or the west side?

I backtracked. The tents all looked the same in the quartzlight. I took a different turn... and now found myself standing on the path that led out to the open part of the valley. Out toward the shrine.

There were footprints in the dirt. Very fresh. Hard-edged, square toe. Where had I seen that before? I looked up the path, raising the lantern. There was something else. I stepped forward to investigate. It was a heap of cloth, harak-cloth, in small strips. Further up the path, there was another bundle cast to the side.

I kept walking, quickening my pace. More bits of cloth here and there. More footprints. Soon, the edge of the shrine loomed ahead. I moved toward it, stepping gingerly through the rope-grids that were stretched over the ground. I made a circuit of the shrine, then I climbed up on top. I wasn’t even sure what I was looking for. I shed quartzlight all around, then I stooped to look into the stairwell. The dust on the stairs had recently been disturbed—

“Get down from there,” a voice said, and I whirled to see the towering figure of the Athori Tasius standing on the trail.

“You—” I said. “What are you doing here?”

“I have every right,” the Athori said, stepping forward. “Remove yourself from the sacred Amaja!”

I put up my hands appeasingly and complied, climbing back down to the ground and taking a few steps toward him.

“I saw footprints on the trail up here,” I said. “Were they yours?”

“On the trail? No. I came from the hills. I have been charged to keep watch over the Amaja, to make sure no one further contaminates the site.” 

“Did you see anyone come here ahead of me?”

“No.”

“There’s been a theft in the camp,” I said. “Do you have anything to do with that?” I immediately regretted asking so directly.

“Theft?” The Athori’s eyes widened. “Theft of what?” He took another step toward me.

“Uh...”

“Tell me!”

“The mask! The... the Kanohi, you call it. Someone took it tonight.”

“What else?”

“Nothing,” I lied.

The Athori said a word that was foreign to me. Probably a curse. He looked back toward the camp. His hands were clenched.

“Listen,” I said, “it looks like someone has entered the shrine. It wasn’t you, was it?”

“I am forbidden, without the Tura,” he said.

“Well, I’ll need to check inside.” I took a step back toward the shrine. “It will only take a second. If you’ll just wait here—”

A heavy, armored grip fell on my shoulder and I was forcefully turned back around. The Athori was fast, and very strong.

“The Amaja will not be touched again,” his voice said, deadly serious. I could feel hot breath through the mouth-piece of his mask. “You and your people have brought rahi upon this place, but no more. Now, I—”

He stopped suddenly, and I felt his fingers seize. He was looking past me, up at the shrine. I turned slowly.

Glowing eyes. An ancient mask. A small figure stood upon the top of the shrine, unmoving. I could see it. The Athori could see it. It was no hallucination this time. Not a dream.

“M-manas!” the Athori croaked. “Get back!”

He shoved me to the side before I could say a word.

And then he burst into flame.

Real flame, like the elementals of old who had been devoured by the Great Beings’ wrath. I didn’t even have time to register shock or surprise before the heat washed over me. Instinctively I threw up my arms to protect myself.

“Stop!” I shouted, scrambling away. “You’ll damage the site! Stop it!”

The fire whirled up and resolved into a glowing nimbus around the Athori’s hands and head. He drew a strange tool from a slot in his armor, and aimed it at the figure atop the shrine.

“No!”

Something flew out of the dark—a whirling rope-like thing—and wrapped itself around Tasius’s burning face and neck. The ends of the bolas whirled for a split second before they snapped tight, and the loud clack of the weights meeting their target made my teeth hurt. The fire went out suddenly, and the scene plunged into darkness. I heard the tramp of feet on the path, and voices shouting. Quartzlight bobbed in the distance. 

I was already up and over the top of the shrine before I knew what I was doing. The figure was gone. The opening of the stairwell yawned before me—cool dark after the furnace heat—and I was scrambling down the stairs, two at a time.

“Wait!” I shouted, but my voice was blunted on the stone. “Come back!” 

Turn after turn I went. I wasn’t thinking straight. It was pitch-black. I should have grabbed my lantern, but I had dropped it. I realized my hands were burned. They stung when I touched the wall, feeling my way along. I stumbled, picked myself up, and then felt earth against my fingers. The wall of earth where we had stopped excavating. No one was here... Had I been mistaken? Had the figure not gone back into the shrine? Maybe it had run off... 

There was light, I realized. It wasn’t pitch-black here. My eyes adjusted, and I saw with a shock that the earth wall wasn’t a wall anymore. It had been dug through, shoveled back and shored up into the walls of a narrow tunnel. When had the others done this? Why hadn’t they notified me? There were handprints in the dust, I noticed. Squared-off palm, five fingers.

Heedless, I push on, squeezing through the tunnel, wriggling on my chest. For a moment I thought I was stuck, and panic surged, but then I was through, and there was no more earth. No more dirt or sediment. The stairs on the other side were clear, pristine. We had been so close, after all. 

The light was stronger here, filtering up from somewhere below me. Coming up out of the stone itself. I had been here before, hadn’t I? No, not possible. I had just come through the tunnel... and I was descending... or had I been ascending? My mind was... my mind was kuru, and... foggy... What was I doing here again? I was waiting for something, wasn’t I? Waiting for a roaring sound... a darkness to come and cover me. I had been here many times, in my dreams.

No, that had been before, long ago. This time it was different. I was descending, and the light was getting stronger. Another bend of the stairs, and then the stairs ended.

It was a round, level, circular room—just like the many others I had seen before. The first thing I noticed was the Pedestal. In shrines of this kind, there was usually a square pedestal at one end, surmounted by a face-like image. In later types, the image was the skull of an animal, usually a Spikit or an Ironwolf.

On this one, there was a mask. It was the mask. It was glowing, and the light was coming out of every surface. My heart was thudding. 

I was not alone. The body lay in a heap on the ground before the pedestal. I could see scorch marks on its back and upper arms. I came closer and saw that it was moving slightly. Slow breaths. The eyes glowed faintly.

I touched it, gently, almost reverently. It was strange how my mind resisted the idea that this was no longer... remains... It was living, somehow. After all these eons, it was alive. The dim eyes shifted, fixed on me. The mouth moved, and the wedge-like shapes ground out their halting syllables and words, but I still could not understand. 

How had it gotten the mask?

A crawling thing, with glowing eyes, searching, reaching. 

A shape under fabric, stretched out on a table in the dark. 

What was happening to me?

I was walking under stars. I was crawling, dragging through the dust. I was standing in front of myself, looking down at myself. I was holding my face in my hands. I was touching an ancient mask in a small, cramped space, and sparks were leaping into me. Its metal was cold against my fingers. The Kanohi are precious, I remembered. They connect us to the spirit of Mata...

It was dark all around. It was roaring. It was kuru, ai kuru, ai kuru ai—

A metal hand touched me weakly and brought me back to reality. The finger pointed up at the glowing mask atop the pedestal, and I understood. It needed the mask—its personal Kanochus.The mask had activated the shrine, but the circuit was incomplete. It needed the mask back, in order to accomplish whatever purpose it intended. Whatever purpose it had been kept from all those eons ago.

There was a noise on the stairs. Voices murmuring. The thud of metal on stone. How much time had passed? I had lost track. They would be looking for me. Hopefully the rangers had done their work.

“I’m here!” I shouted up. The voices continued. The hand gripped my arm again. The mouth ground out more words.

“I know,” I said. 

I stood and pulled the mask off the pedestal. It sparked in my hands, and I felt a charge go through me... or maybe that feeling had already been there, ever since I touched the mask, days ago. Something had been clinging to me. I felt it now. Something intangible, something in my thoughts and my dreams. I had joked about trapped souls to Neisa, but now I wasn’t so sure...

The light increased. I bent toward the body... not just a body—toward the Matoran... and—

A wave of heat rushed down the stairwell, and a burning smell filled the chamber. I froze, and fear surged in my chest as I turned my head to look.

It was the old Skrall. He was standing on the stairs, leaning on his staff. His eyes were sharp behind his mask, and somewhere in the back of my mind it clicked, that although the masks of the Adherents were clearly forged like the one I now held, they were subtly different, like a picture whose original reference had been lost. A copy of a copy of a copy...

“Hold a moment,” the Skrall said urgently. “You stand on sacred ground. Disturb not the machines of the Great Beings.”

“I don’t know what that means.” I stood up and turned around slowly. The Skrall’s eyes widened as he saw what I was holding... and what was slumped behind me.

“That Kanohi...” he hissed, descending another step. “It is meant for the Children of Mata alone. You must give it to me—it is not for you to touch!”

“I’ve already touched it. It has... shown me things. Things I don’t understand.”

The Skrall’s breath hissed in his mask.

“Give it to me, and all shall be restored to unity.”

“It’s not yours. It belongs to... to this one.” I pointed at the Matoran. The dim eyes looked at the wizened elder, but the Skrall averted his gaze.

“This is not in accord with our canons,” he intoned. 

“I don’t—”

“Such things only lead to greater kuru.”

I was on a stairway. I was on a great open plain, beneath two suns. My face was covered, but it was not my face. Not anymore. It belonged to someone else.

“You’re wrong.” I held the mask close.

“The canon shall not be denied, nor shall it be mocked. Give me the mask.”

The Skrall was not alone now. Another figure moved into the stairwell behind him. A cracked and broken mask, a bruised and bloodied face. More heat poured into the chamber as the Athori Tasius descended, eyes still glowing with fire.

I shrank back to the pedestal, and the lights of the shrine brightened further. The Matoran moved pitifully. We were trapped. The pedestal was humming. Waiting. 

Waiting.

The Athori was moving, hindered by the small opening. His armored hand reached out at me, white-hot.

But I had already placed the mask on the Matoran’s face, and the charge that I had felt in my body went out of me... back into the mask, into the Matoran.

And the shrine was blazing white with light, and the pedestal was retracting into the wall. And the Skrall was staggering back onto the stairs, eyes raving. And the Athori was still moving forward, overbalanced, tipping forward into suddenly empty space.

The walls were pulled back and then were gone as the bottom of the shrine became a circular platform and dropped down, down into pitch-black. The stairwell shrank into the distance above us, and I saw the Athori hang for a moment, glowing with heat. Then he fell, whirling like a fiery meteor, right past the edge of the descending platform and away into the greater dark. 

Gone.

A few moments passed, maybe longer. I sank down on the platform, exhausted and spent. The Matoran was sitting next to me. It reached out and gripped my shoulder with its metal hand. Its eyes were glowing bright again, and the light in its chest blinked steadily, despite the corrosion and scorch-marks that covered the rest of its body. It looked at me, and its mouth shifted into a different configuration. 

I think it was smiling. 

Cold air rushed past us as we fell onward, onward into unknown. I don’t know how long we spent in that smooth descent. I looked up and saw nothing above, and nothing on either side. I wondered if I would ever see the surface again, if I would ever have a chance to tell someone. I wondered what was happened or had happened in the camp. I wondered if anyone else but the two Adherents knew what had happened to me, to the mask, to the Matoran...

Except for the light of the platform beneath us, it was dark all around. Featureless, unbroken dark. 

“Kuru,” I said aloud, unbidden, remembering the word.

“Ha te ai kuru,” my companion replied, nodding.

I shivered and rubbed my arms. 

“Ukuru,” I said.

“Ru,” it replied, standing up. “Ru te aikuru. Akuya.”

The Matoran went to the edge of the platform—too close for my comfort—and pointed out into the surrounding dark. 

“Akuya,” it said, and gestured at my... my eyes. My aku. Look. It beckoned me and pointed again. And hesitating, shivering, I rose and went to where it stood, and looked out. And I saw:

Rising up over us, ascending as we descended into the depths of Spherus Magna... Deeper than any excavation could reach, deeper than the catacombs of lost Atero, or the mass tombs of the Glatori hosts, farther and deeper than the silo-vaults of the Great Beings, or the maze-labyrinths of Old Skralla, or the vast mutated seabeds of Old Spherus... Far beyond the reach of Quadrates or Adherencies, of charters or canons...

Past the unknown dark, the aikuru...

Many of these stories feature beings called Matoran: the biomechanical worker-beings of a vast, artificial world. The Matoran were designed as automatons by their creators (an enigmatic group known only as the “Great Beings) but later evolved by unknown means to become self-aware and self-actualizing while still keeping to their original programming as maintainers of the world. Alongside Matoran are the Toa—powerful elemental warriors who are sworn to serve and protect—as well as the Turaga, elders who guide and govern the Matoran (and who were formerly Toa themselves). An array of other creatures and species are present as well, with their own special characteristics and functions in keeping the great Machine of the World running.

Many of these stories explore themes related to the emergence of self-actualization, culture, and emotional complexity amongst the Matoran and the other beings they share the universe with. A similar theme of these stories is “forbidden knowledge”, dealing with cases where the creatures of BIONICLE gain some knowledge about the nature of their world and are forced to grapple with it, sometimes with disastrous results. Themes of death, loss, change, companionship, betrayal, curiosity, obsession, and the weariness of duty may also be found.

Some stories are set within specific moments of the larger BIONICLE narrative, both past and future, and feature established characters and settings from the lore, while others feature entirely original characters and settings.

The final story in the anthology is different. It is not set within the artificial world of the Matoran, but instead on the world of the “Great Beings” themselves, called Spherus Magna—a planet which was shattered and then remade by the machine-world of the Matoran (which took the form of a planetoid-sized robot). The story is set long after the conclusion of the story of BIONICLE proper, in a time when the inhabitants of Spherus Magna have moved on from the destruction of the past in many ways, but remain nevertheless fascinated by the mysteries buried beneath the surface of their world . . . with some even attempting to unearth those mysteries, for better or worse.