True Colours.
Chapter three.
Rayman glanced around the entrance to the main chamber of the cave and grinned as he spotted Jano, fast asleep in a shadowy corner and emitting gentle snores. Four zombie chickens kept drifting towards him but withdrew hastily every time he breathed out. Jano's face looked more peaceful than usual, the cold hardness that usually played across his features had evaporated. For the mean time anyway.
Careful not to trip on the uneven floor, Rayman pushed an ancient cobweb aside and entered the cave, trying to make his footsteps as silent as the echo filled cave would allow. The zombie chickens whipped around and, forgetting all about Jano, targeted Rayman instead. He shot a dangerous glare at them and they stopped dead. On raising one of his fists slightly they scuttled off into a corner. Rayman paid no further attention to them and raised his hands as he got within feet of Jano, ready to cause an abrupt return from unconsciousness.
"Don't even think about it!"
Startled, Rayman jumped away in fright and almost raised energy spheres to his hands as Jano's eye shot open and his rough voice filled the cave. The zombie chickens were making a noise that sounded like a derisive laugh. Jano rolled over and grinned as Rayman laughed nervously, seeing the funny side after the initial heart attack.
"So," He said, sitting down as Jano yawned and stretched. "How does it feel to be free?"
"Odd. Four hundred years of being imprisoned in here, next thing you know, you've got an irate Sasha telling the spirit of the world what to do."
Rayman's face darkened slightly.
"She's feeling really guilty about that actually." Rayman changed his voice into a tone uncannily like Sasha's. "'But I could've really hurt him, there's no excuse for what I did!' No matter how many times I tell her that he deserved it, she won't forgive herself."
Jano sighed.
"Is there any such thing as someone having too good a heart?"
"Oh yes."
A silence fell upon the two friends, the light-hearted atmosphere killed as both their thoughts turned to Sasha. It was several seconds until Rayman shook himself and remembered why he had come to the cave in the first place.
"Oh!" He exclaimed suddenly, making Jano jump. "I almost forgot. You're coming to the Fairy Council to have it officially recorded that you're innocent!"
Jano's eye widened slightly at this dramatic announcement. Clearly, this had been decided between Rayman and Sasha last night. It was all very well being able to walk out of his prison after four hundred years but actually doing so was a different matter entirely.
As though Rayman could hear what was going on in Jano's mind, he began to speak hurriedly.
"Jano, it may as well be now that you come out of here. Start as you mean to go on. If you don't, you'll be thinking about going out forever, but you never will."
"You're right." Jano sighed. "You are right and I know it. Alright, I'll come voluntarily. You don't need to call Sasha to, uh. 'convince me.'"
Rayman grinned.
"I did have her on hold!" He teased.
"Do I have to call Polokus?"
"No, I've already.." Rayman's sentence was interrupted by Polokus strolling into the cave.
"Arranged it." Rayman finished.
Polokus smiled at Jano who returned it with a smile of his own, then turned to Rayman.
"Sasha's waiting for you two."
"Impatiently, no doubt. C'mon Jano."
The God watched the two leave and as he was left alone in the cave and shivered slightly at the injustice he had inflicted so long ago. But at least it was being put right now. He thought to himself, impatiently brushing away a curious zombie chicken with a gesture.
* * *
As they made their way through the woods, Jano was happy to listen as Rayman pointed out various things that he had never seen before.
"Look up there, that's a Ludiv, a type of fairy." Jano glanced up and spotted a small creature with wings and dressed in purple cloths and an outsized hat. The Ludiv hovered above them and waved at Rayman. Rayman smiled and waved back and the fairy then turned her attention on Jano and waved at him.
There was a small delay, in which Jano was stunned that he wasn't being shunned by people. Here was a creature that could see exactly what he was and it was waving at him as though it had known him for years! Aware that both the Ludiv and Rayman were giving him funny looks, Jano hastily raised his hand and waved back. The Ludiv smiled and disappeared in a shower of silver and gold glitter.
"That's not the reaction I expected." Jano muttered, as Rayman brushed glitter out of his hair.
They continued walking and Jano couldn't stop himself from looking in wonder at the simplest things like healthy trees and wild animals wandering around the wood. The closest thing Jano had seen to wild animals were zombie chickens and what he was seeing now was somewhat different.
"Where does that lead to?" Rayman's eyes followed Jano's pointing finger along a pathway that led to the east of his tree.
"That leads to the beach. It's called Whale Bay. Sasha loves to go swimming with Carmen there. Carmen's a whale." He added, answering Jano's questioning glance. "You'll have to come with us sometime when we go there, we sometimes take a picnic and it's lovely."
They had walked out of the woods now and Sasha's voice was audible.
"Damn it, damn it, damn it!" Rayman and Jano drew closer and saw that she had enlisted Clark's help with her martial arts practice. Clark was holding a kick-pad and Sasha was attacking it furiously, bringing her knee up beneath it with such strength that even Clark's muscular arms jerked slightly as she struck.
"Ok, roundhouse please!" Clark switched the position of the pad and Sasha sank into a combat stance. She raised her fists into a defence position and concentrated for a second, her eyes fixed on her target. Then, bringing her lower hand swinging downwards, she leapt into the air and slammed the top of her foot into the pad in an immaculate flying roundhouse.
"Ok, cheers Clark." Sasha gasped, leaning against the tree.
Clark slung the pad down against the tree and nodded before he went on his way.
"Hi Sasha!" Sasha jumped around as Rayman addressed her and just one look at her face was enough for someone to tell that she was in a foul mood. But the scowl disappeared from her face as her eyes alighted on Jano.
"Hi! Are you ready?"
* * *
It was a silent group that entered the Fairy Council. Jano was silent because he was secretly worrying about maybe meeting the very same people who had imprisoned him so long ago, Rayman was silent because he was thinking about the injustice that had been caused in the very place he was standing in. And Sasha. Her face was impassive and no-one could read her inner thoughts by looking at her face unless she wished it so.
Jano stopped moving as he entered the Council and Rayman and Sasha stopped beside him. Two Grand Minimus Teensies and one Ludiv were standing a few metres away, waiting for Jano and one other figure stood slightly apart from the others.
She was beautiful. She was a fairy but a fairy unlike any Jano had ever heard of. She was taller than average, towering high above himself and Rayman and a head shorter than Sasha. Her shining purple hair just touched her shoulders and a she had a long tail of the same colour. And her eyes. they were big and full of spirit and power. She seemed so familiar, like Jano had seen her before in a far away dream, a far away memory.
She began to walk slowly to meet them and Jano closed his eye, remembering something that he had been desperately trying to forget for four hundred years...
iThe Justice Chamber was a part of the world unknown to most. It was very rarely needed and as no-one who had been inside it, save Polokus and the Council, had escaped with their freedom no inhabitants of the world knew about it.
It was situated deep underground the Council and was little more than a dirty cave, which would be considered an embarrassment to the perfection of the paradise above it. Candles provided flickering light and shadows were cast across the faces of the four council members and Polokus, giving them a strangely ominous, sinister look.
A young Jano stood before the five magical beings, absolutely terrified but still stubbornly repeating that he was innocent, that he was not part of the attack.
"Cyclopics Monstropes!" Polokus' voice echoed across the chamber. Jano stiffened. Not once had they called him by his real name. "We will now pass judgement. Ariadni!"
Jano raised his eye to the four judges towering above him, sitting at a high wooden table. All of their faces were concealed in shadow but he could feel their eyes boring into him.
The first judge, Ariadni presumably, spoke to the silent room.
"Guilty!"
Jano's heart sank. He felt like he was sinking slowly to the bottom of a very deep ocean, surrounded by blackness and his lungs were being crushed by lack of air which lay so tantalisingly above him. The light was receding.
Jano knew that Polokus was calling upon the next two judges to pass their verdict but he couldn't hear them, nor did he need to. He already knew his sentence.
"Ly!"
The final judge leaned forwards so she was illuminated. Jano suppressed a gasp as he clearly saw one of the people who were judging him.
Ly was a fairy, fairly young by the looks of her and very unusual. Her body was decorated in deep purple markings and she had a tail of a lighter shade of purple and hair to match. She was looking down on. No, she was looking at him, not down on him and her catlike eyes seemed to be searching his soul. Jano could sense the power held within her and he stood transfixed.
After what seemed an eternity, she turned her head to look at Polokus and in a clear, carrying voice said:
"Not guilty!"
An unexplainable happiness flooded inside Jano. It made no difference, the majority thought him guilty but here was someone who thought him innocent.!
Polokus began to tell the room the verdict and summarise the trial but his voice was just meaningless noise in Jano's ears. His entire attention was fixed on Ly, and her entire attention was fixed on him. The other three judges were listening to Polokus and no-one noticed as Ly slipped down from her chair and knelt in front of Jano.
"I'm so sorry." She whispered. "I'm so sorry. You're not guilty, there's no blackness in your soul. You will be imprisoned and I cannot prevent that but remember." Ly paused and took a tentative glance towards Polokus. Seeing that he was still summarising the trial, she continued. "One day, many years from now, everything will turn out right. Hold on to that in your moments of darkest despair." /I
Jano's eye flickered open and Ly was standing directly in front of him, looking older but still possessing that same breath-taking beauty. His face twisted into the first true smile with all the feeling that every one of his false smiles tried to echo.
"Hello Ly."
"Hello Jano."
* * *
"Did you see her go?"
"No, but I know where she went."
Rayman and Jano hurried through the woods, heading back to the cave. Clearing Jano's name had taken longer than had been anticipated, as it involved a lot of long-winded paper work and Sasha had disappeared during the tedious process.
The two entered the cave just in time to see Sasha and Polokus emerging from an inner chamber. Rayman shot Jano a told-you-so kind of look.
"Even so, you still should have decked me Polokus." Sasha was saying.
"Nothing of the sort."
Jano smiled. Just as Ly had promised so long ago, everything had turned out right, no matter how much he had doubted her words since they had been spoken. Everything in the world was perfect. Everything.
iI've seen my true colours,
Shining through,
I've seen my true colours,
And that's why I've come through,
And I'm not afraid,
To let them show,
My true colours, true colours,
They're beautiful,
Like a rainbow. /i
Chapter three.
Rayman glanced around the entrance to the main chamber of the cave and grinned as he spotted Jano, fast asleep in a shadowy corner and emitting gentle snores. Four zombie chickens kept drifting towards him but withdrew hastily every time he breathed out. Jano's face looked more peaceful than usual, the cold hardness that usually played across his features had evaporated. For the mean time anyway.
Careful not to trip on the uneven floor, Rayman pushed an ancient cobweb aside and entered the cave, trying to make his footsteps as silent as the echo filled cave would allow. The zombie chickens whipped around and, forgetting all about Jano, targeted Rayman instead. He shot a dangerous glare at them and they stopped dead. On raising one of his fists slightly they scuttled off into a corner. Rayman paid no further attention to them and raised his hands as he got within feet of Jano, ready to cause an abrupt return from unconsciousness.
"Don't even think about it!"
Startled, Rayman jumped away in fright and almost raised energy spheres to his hands as Jano's eye shot open and his rough voice filled the cave. The zombie chickens were making a noise that sounded like a derisive laugh. Jano rolled over and grinned as Rayman laughed nervously, seeing the funny side after the initial heart attack.
"So," He said, sitting down as Jano yawned and stretched. "How does it feel to be free?"
"Odd. Four hundred years of being imprisoned in here, next thing you know, you've got an irate Sasha telling the spirit of the world what to do."
Rayman's face darkened slightly.
"She's feeling really guilty about that actually." Rayman changed his voice into a tone uncannily like Sasha's. "'But I could've really hurt him, there's no excuse for what I did!' No matter how many times I tell her that he deserved it, she won't forgive herself."
Jano sighed.
"Is there any such thing as someone having too good a heart?"
"Oh yes."
A silence fell upon the two friends, the light-hearted atmosphere killed as both their thoughts turned to Sasha. It was several seconds until Rayman shook himself and remembered why he had come to the cave in the first place.
"Oh!" He exclaimed suddenly, making Jano jump. "I almost forgot. You're coming to the Fairy Council to have it officially recorded that you're innocent!"
Jano's eye widened slightly at this dramatic announcement. Clearly, this had been decided between Rayman and Sasha last night. It was all very well being able to walk out of his prison after four hundred years but actually doing so was a different matter entirely.
As though Rayman could hear what was going on in Jano's mind, he began to speak hurriedly.
"Jano, it may as well be now that you come out of here. Start as you mean to go on. If you don't, you'll be thinking about going out forever, but you never will."
"You're right." Jano sighed. "You are right and I know it. Alright, I'll come voluntarily. You don't need to call Sasha to, uh. 'convince me.'"
Rayman grinned.
"I did have her on hold!" He teased.
"Do I have to call Polokus?"
"No, I've already.." Rayman's sentence was interrupted by Polokus strolling into the cave.
"Arranged it." Rayman finished.
Polokus smiled at Jano who returned it with a smile of his own, then turned to Rayman.
"Sasha's waiting for you two."
"Impatiently, no doubt. C'mon Jano."
The God watched the two leave and as he was left alone in the cave and shivered slightly at the injustice he had inflicted so long ago. But at least it was being put right now. He thought to himself, impatiently brushing away a curious zombie chicken with a gesture.
* * *
As they made their way through the woods, Jano was happy to listen as Rayman pointed out various things that he had never seen before.
"Look up there, that's a Ludiv, a type of fairy." Jano glanced up and spotted a small creature with wings and dressed in purple cloths and an outsized hat. The Ludiv hovered above them and waved at Rayman. Rayman smiled and waved back and the fairy then turned her attention on Jano and waved at him.
There was a small delay, in which Jano was stunned that he wasn't being shunned by people. Here was a creature that could see exactly what he was and it was waving at him as though it had known him for years! Aware that both the Ludiv and Rayman were giving him funny looks, Jano hastily raised his hand and waved back. The Ludiv smiled and disappeared in a shower of silver and gold glitter.
"That's not the reaction I expected." Jano muttered, as Rayman brushed glitter out of his hair.
They continued walking and Jano couldn't stop himself from looking in wonder at the simplest things like healthy trees and wild animals wandering around the wood. The closest thing Jano had seen to wild animals were zombie chickens and what he was seeing now was somewhat different.
"Where does that lead to?" Rayman's eyes followed Jano's pointing finger along a pathway that led to the east of his tree.
"That leads to the beach. It's called Whale Bay. Sasha loves to go swimming with Carmen there. Carmen's a whale." He added, answering Jano's questioning glance. "You'll have to come with us sometime when we go there, we sometimes take a picnic and it's lovely."
They had walked out of the woods now and Sasha's voice was audible.
"Damn it, damn it, damn it!" Rayman and Jano drew closer and saw that she had enlisted Clark's help with her martial arts practice. Clark was holding a kick-pad and Sasha was attacking it furiously, bringing her knee up beneath it with such strength that even Clark's muscular arms jerked slightly as she struck.
"Ok, roundhouse please!" Clark switched the position of the pad and Sasha sank into a combat stance. She raised her fists into a defence position and concentrated for a second, her eyes fixed on her target. Then, bringing her lower hand swinging downwards, she leapt into the air and slammed the top of her foot into the pad in an immaculate flying roundhouse.
"Ok, cheers Clark." Sasha gasped, leaning against the tree.
Clark slung the pad down against the tree and nodded before he went on his way.
"Hi Sasha!" Sasha jumped around as Rayman addressed her and just one look at her face was enough for someone to tell that she was in a foul mood. But the scowl disappeared from her face as her eyes alighted on Jano.
"Hi! Are you ready?"
* * *
It was a silent group that entered the Fairy Council. Jano was silent because he was secretly worrying about maybe meeting the very same people who had imprisoned him so long ago, Rayman was silent because he was thinking about the injustice that had been caused in the very place he was standing in. And Sasha. Her face was impassive and no-one could read her inner thoughts by looking at her face unless she wished it so.
Jano stopped moving as he entered the Council and Rayman and Sasha stopped beside him. Two Grand Minimus Teensies and one Ludiv were standing a few metres away, waiting for Jano and one other figure stood slightly apart from the others.
She was beautiful. She was a fairy but a fairy unlike any Jano had ever heard of. She was taller than average, towering high above himself and Rayman and a head shorter than Sasha. Her shining purple hair just touched her shoulders and a she had a long tail of the same colour. And her eyes. they were big and full of spirit and power. She seemed so familiar, like Jano had seen her before in a far away dream, a far away memory.
She began to walk slowly to meet them and Jano closed his eye, remembering something that he had been desperately trying to forget for four hundred years...
iThe Justice Chamber was a part of the world unknown to most. It was very rarely needed and as no-one who had been inside it, save Polokus and the Council, had escaped with their freedom no inhabitants of the world knew about it.
It was situated deep underground the Council and was little more than a dirty cave, which would be considered an embarrassment to the perfection of the paradise above it. Candles provided flickering light and shadows were cast across the faces of the four council members and Polokus, giving them a strangely ominous, sinister look.
A young Jano stood before the five magical beings, absolutely terrified but still stubbornly repeating that he was innocent, that he was not part of the attack.
"Cyclopics Monstropes!" Polokus' voice echoed across the chamber. Jano stiffened. Not once had they called him by his real name. "We will now pass judgement. Ariadni!"
Jano raised his eye to the four judges towering above him, sitting at a high wooden table. All of their faces were concealed in shadow but he could feel their eyes boring into him.
The first judge, Ariadni presumably, spoke to the silent room.
"Guilty!"
Jano's heart sank. He felt like he was sinking slowly to the bottom of a very deep ocean, surrounded by blackness and his lungs were being crushed by lack of air which lay so tantalisingly above him. The light was receding.
Jano knew that Polokus was calling upon the next two judges to pass their verdict but he couldn't hear them, nor did he need to. He already knew his sentence.
"Ly!"
The final judge leaned forwards so she was illuminated. Jano suppressed a gasp as he clearly saw one of the people who were judging him.
Ly was a fairy, fairly young by the looks of her and very unusual. Her body was decorated in deep purple markings and she had a tail of a lighter shade of purple and hair to match. She was looking down on. No, she was looking at him, not down on him and her catlike eyes seemed to be searching his soul. Jano could sense the power held within her and he stood transfixed.
After what seemed an eternity, she turned her head to look at Polokus and in a clear, carrying voice said:
"Not guilty!"
An unexplainable happiness flooded inside Jano. It made no difference, the majority thought him guilty but here was someone who thought him innocent.!
Polokus began to tell the room the verdict and summarise the trial but his voice was just meaningless noise in Jano's ears. His entire attention was fixed on Ly, and her entire attention was fixed on him. The other three judges were listening to Polokus and no-one noticed as Ly slipped down from her chair and knelt in front of Jano.
"I'm so sorry." She whispered. "I'm so sorry. You're not guilty, there's no blackness in your soul. You will be imprisoned and I cannot prevent that but remember." Ly paused and took a tentative glance towards Polokus. Seeing that he was still summarising the trial, she continued. "One day, many years from now, everything will turn out right. Hold on to that in your moments of darkest despair." /I
Jano's eye flickered open and Ly was standing directly in front of him, looking older but still possessing that same breath-taking beauty. His face twisted into the first true smile with all the feeling that every one of his false smiles tried to echo.
"Hello Ly."
"Hello Jano."
* * *
"Did you see her go?"
"No, but I know where she went."
Rayman and Jano hurried through the woods, heading back to the cave. Clearing Jano's name had taken longer than had been anticipated, as it involved a lot of long-winded paper work and Sasha had disappeared during the tedious process.
The two entered the cave just in time to see Sasha and Polokus emerging from an inner chamber. Rayman shot Jano a told-you-so kind of look.
"Even so, you still should have decked me Polokus." Sasha was saying.
"Nothing of the sort."
Jano smiled. Just as Ly had promised so long ago, everything had turned out right, no matter how much he had doubted her words since they had been spoken. Everything in the world was perfect. Everything.
iI've seen my true colours,
Shining through,
I've seen my true colours,
And that's why I've come through,
And I'm not afraid,
To let them show,
My true colours, true colours,
They're beautiful,
Like a rainbow. /i