[i]Rys[/i] The young Guardian screams in the darkness. A long, loud, echoing scream that rings across the prison block. The sound lasts for several seconds, and many nearby Cabal soldiers glanced at the doors to the cell. The pure agony and desperation in the scream was almost unbearable; a sympathetic Guardian would’ve gone above and beyond to help the one who made the sound. But there are no other Guardians here. Finally the scream ends. Rys pants as he stares into the face of his warden. “WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME?!” He smiles. “Your pain. Your Light. Whatever’s left of you when I’m through.” “Then kill me already!” Rys sobs. “PLEASE!” “Can’t take much more, can you? Tsk. Shame. I thought you were stronger than that, Rysedian.” “I am not strong.” The words leave the Warlock’s mouth before he knows he said them. He realizes they had been on the tip of his tongue for hours, days maybe. A truth he had come to accept – even embrace. Rysedian Buern is not strong. The cabal grins and leans down. Rys looks away and closes his eyes, not wanting to see the pleasure on the soldier’s face. “Say it again.” Rys’ mouth quivers. “Say. It. Again.” “I…am not strong. I am not strong.” Rys feels a weight come off of him, his last spark he kept to fight his torture. His will is shattered, his resolve turned to ash. Rysedian Buern has given up. “Good, Warlock…” the soldier purrs. “Now…your end.” He raises a pistol the size of Rys’ head and -blam!- back the hammer. Rys feels nothing. He scoffs inwardly. He HAD been broken. He thought it would never happen but here he hung: limp and scarred, all determination gone. He can scarcely believe it. He squeezes his eyes shut tighter to meet his fate. A gun fires, but Rys does not die. He slowly looks up. The cabal is lying in the floor, black oil pouring from his head. Behind him stands someone he thought he would never see again. Tetra had come for him. [i]Tetra[/i] “RYS!” Trinity squeals, rushing toward the captive Guardian. “Thank the Light you’re alive…but ew, you look terrible. You should really clean up.” “Trinity?” he asks weakly. “How did you…” “Long story, buster. We’ll tell ya when we get out of this turd of a prison. Tetra, help him out?” The Huntress does not hesitate before shooting the chains that held Rys to the wall. Her mask conceals her face, and she watches the concern grow on the Warlock’s face as he gazes at her. “One thing you SHOULD know,” Trinity was saying, “is that Tetra here has no idea who you are. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. That, and she doesn’t remember most of the last few years. So yeah.” Rys nods. “Absent Light Syndrome. I’ve heard of it.” “Wait…it has a NAME?!” “Yes. Happens when Light is…absent. Rarely, very rarely. That in combination with the fall from the courtyard would double, maybe triple the odds of obtaining it. Amnesia is one symptom, but there’s countless that she could have…” “We don’t have time to get a diagnosis, Warlock,” Tetra snaps. “We need to focus on getting out of here before all the Red Legion eats us for lunch. Can you walk?” “Doubtful,” Trinity says. “He's beat up, Tetra. Bad. Get your cronies in here to help him out.” “They’re not my – whatever. In here!” She calls. Two soldiers dressed in dark clothes rush to Rys’ side and help him up. “Lead the way,” the Ghost says before vanishing. Tetra looks out into the hall. It’s clear, but it won’t be for long. She steps out of the cell. “Well!” a voice exclaims happily. Tetra raises her guns at a young woman her age sporting lots of red. A Warlock, judging by the garb. But why did Tetra have a bad feeling about this? “I was just coming to get Rys myself,” the stranger explains, raising a revolver. “But probably not for the same purpose.” “Who are you?” She smiles sweetly. “The name's Cornelia. But you may call me ‘madam.’”