“About 500 years ago, planet Earth was invaded by a galactic force named The Order of the Iniquitous. Earth became a nuclear zone, with radioactive chemicals polluting the air. Some people were able to get onto the Teleport Pod without any hesitation— and those were the elite politicians, which included all of our ancestors. The worthless beings were left to die from radiation and suffer at the hands of me, the leader of the Order. And due to my actions, we are here today. Here in front of us all is the new general, who shall pledge allegiance to The Order of the Iniquitous today in front of us all. Please welcome Octavia Darma to the stage.”
    I marched up the stairs, my black robe flowing behind me in the wind that surged through the open windows.
    “Raise your left hand, and repeat after me,” Lord Incubus’s voice rang out.
    I raised my left hand and stared into the man’s unsympathetic black eyes.
    “I, Octavia Darma,” he stated.
    “I, Octavia Darma,” I repeated, an urge of confidence in my voice.
    “Pledge allegiance to The Order of the Iniquitous and all of its beliefs.”
    “Pledge allegiance to The Order of the Iniquitous and all of its beliefs.”
    “I pledge to follow Lord Incubus’s orders, protect the Order, and prevent the Republic of Abraham from destroying the system that we have installed that has lasted for 5 centuries.”
    “I pledge to follow Lord Incubus’s orders, protect the Order, and prevent the Republic of Abraham from destroying the system that we have installed that has lasted for5 centuries.”
    Cheers and war ballads broke out over the crowd and a small grin etched onto Lord Incubus’s face.
    “I present to you, the people of the Order, General Octavia Darma!”
    Hollers of excitement continued to erupt from the crowd of the people of the Order, lasting only until the sound of a laser gun reached my ears.
    Officer Celestial, a man in a white uniform with a belt that held a sword and a gun suddenly made a noise, almost as if he was suffocating on air.
    My eyes quickly averted to where Officer Celestial stood. His white uniform was suddenly a victim of a blood stain. A dark red liquid soaked through his white uniform like a paper towel would soak up water. Celestial’s face, once young and glowing, suddenly went ashen, his cheeks becoming gaunt. The skin seemed to be draining away, leaving outlines of his skeleton. Without any warning, Officer Celestial fell to the floor, his head splitting open on the black tile. If he was not dead from the laser gun, Officer Celestial was certainly dead now.
    “I told you we should have held my inauguration on a different day!” I growled at Lord Incubus, pulling my laser gun out of my belt with a speed that the driver of the U.S.S Orion would have been proud of.
    “Pull out your gun and shoot, General Darma. Show the people that you are going to protect the Order,” he commanded before turning sharply on his heel and marching back into the safety of the bunkers.
    My eyes trailed after him. Lord Incubus was right. If I wanted to gain the trust of the Order, I had to fight back. It didn’t matter whether or not a few people died— as long as it helped the cause of protection for the Order of the Iniquitous, these people would not die in vain.
    Waiting for my laser gun to turn on and charge, I stalked over to the edge of the stage and shredded my cloak. The cloak fell down around my ankles and fell to the floor with a small thump. The trigger of my gun blinked a green color— it was fully charged and ready for use.
    I took in the scene that was being played out in front of me.     There was a figure in a brown leather jacket that had a bright red A with a star behind it sewn onto it’s back that I recognized. I recognized the blue jeans and the worn out black hunting boots. I remembered the scruffy chestnut hair with strands of gray that sat messily on the figure’s head. I knew the gun. Most importantly, I noticed the eyes.
    I was staring right into blue eyes that resembled mine with an icy blue iris with specks of gray that swirled around like small stratus clouds.
    I found myself marching through the cluster of people, through the fighting that was going on between members of the Order of the Iniquitous and the members of the Republic of Abraham. I shot off my laser gun in various directions, targeting the members of the Republic and watching them fall as blood seeped through their tattered clothes and some even dripping down out of their mouths like it was candy. Cries of pain erupted from some of the Order members and I quickly shot a laser beam at them to end their suffering. By the time I reached the familiar figure, I must have put eight  Order members out of their misery and killed sixteen members of the Republic out of cold blood.
    “Octavia—” the figure’s voice stated, a plea of hope in his voice.
    “James,” I sneered at the man, twirling my laser gun in my hand with pure enjoyment. Taunting was always the best way to make your enemies uncomfortable and anxious.
    “Octavia, you can still come back you know. President Abraham— he can pardon you,” he begged.
    I gave a harsh and cruel jolt of laughter at the sheer thought of President Abraham. This man was surely out of his goddamn mind if he was suggesting that I return to the Republic.
    “President Abraham,” I began, my tone switching from crazed to serious, “is a scumbag elected by people who have no ideals nor a clear mindset.”
    “Octavia, Incubus is not a man that you want to pledge allegiance to—”
    “Tell me then, father, why did you shoot Officer Celestial? Surely you knew that I was to be inaugurated today,” I fired back, my blue eyes narrowing into slits as my hatred for this man grew inside of me.
    My father scooted closer and tried to grab my arm, only for me to grip his hand and squeeze it with a bone crushing force. Suddenly, I let his hand go.
    “You’ve lost your chance to try to bring me back,” I growled back at him, my grip on the gun tightening.
    “I know that there’s good in you—”
Before he finished his statement, I pointed my gun at the person who was creeping up behind my father. I recognized the figure— it was Zane Miles, Lord Incubus’s right-hand man. This was my fight, not his.
    I pulled the trigger, and the laser beam ran straight over my father’s head, nearly melting off his hair in the process. Seeing my father squirm and wince as he braced himself to be a victim of my weapon made my mouth twitch into a smirk. My father relaxed once he turned around and saw Zane Miles fall backwards with a blood soaked shirt.
    “S***,” I muttered underneath my breath. My laser gun ran out of laser beams to shoot. I would have to do this the old fashioned way.
    I tossed my gun to the side; it was just a simple waste of artillery now. In reluctance, I pulled my sword out of the leather sheath that was part of the belt that hung around my waist. The handle of the sword felt balanced in my fingertips, not too heavy and not too light all at the same time. The hilt of the sword had ancient runes etched into it. The edge of the blade was sharper than one would think— when I first got it, I doubted that it was that sharp, so I touched it, only to find myself in the infirmary due to a extremely deep papercut looking gash on the tip of my finger. The blade of the sword itself glowed a gold color, and when I held it up straight I was able to see the details of my reflection and all of the action that was going on behind me.
    “Tavia…” my father trailed off once he took sight of the sword I had in my hands.
    “DON’T CALL ME TAVIA!” I roared, my breathing becoming layered and heavy.
    “Octavia, honey, please…”
    I moved closer to my father, ignoring the battle that raged behind me. I brought my sword up to face my father. Suddenly, I found myself kneeling over my father, who was on the ground. His face wasn’t knitted into an expression of fury or disappointment. My father’s mouth simply became a heartbroken smile, and the blue eyes that we shared were welling up with tears.
    My sword was pointed towards his neck, and I found my sword being unbalanced. My hands were trembling so much that I looked like a drug addict going cold turkey or through the withdrawal process.
    “Go on,” the voice in my head that sounded remarkably like Lord Incubus’s urged me, “Kill him. He ruined your life!”
    “You ruined my life,” I growled at my father, echoing what Incubus wanted me to do.
    “Tell him who you killed. Tell him. Break his heart.”
    I blinked back the tears that were welling up in my eyes and repeated, my voice shaking, “I killed them.”
    “Who?” my father replied. I already knew that he was aware of what I would say next.
    “I killed Mom,” I quietly muttered underneath my breath.
    “Tell him how.”
    “No… No…” I muttered, my voice uneven and my breathing heavy.
    I couldn’t do it. This man— this man that was leaning under me— I hated him so, so much. He made my life a living hell. All twenty-one years of it. But seeing my dad, helpless and apparently understanding, with my very own sword pointed at his throat…
    My brown curls blew in front of my face as a gust of wind blasted from behind me, causing me to not be able to see what was going on in front of me.
    “Just kill him already,” Lord Incubus’s voice entered my mind. My grip on the hilt of the sword tightened, and I knew that I had to do it.
    I brought my sword back up to face me and I hesitantly got up off of my father. With my sword placed back in its sheath, I found myself averting my dad’s eyes. I did, however, glance up once. My eyes caught sight of a smile forming on his face. His blue eyes shone with pride and approval. I gave him a brief nod, much like one you would use to acknowledge somebody that you know (but not somebody that you know well enough to say hello to), in acknowledgement. Relief flooded me when I saw my dad nod back at me through the corner of my eye.
    “NO!” Lord Incubus’s voice roared suddenly from behind me, sending chills down my spine. Goosebumps painted themselves onto my skin out of sheer terror.
    Lord Incubus was a man who had pride in only two people: himself and me. He was a classic text-book narcissist, and when he wasn’t putting himself before others, he tended to either be mentoring me or working on plans to attack the Republic of Abraham. For some strange reason, Lord Incubus treated me like a surrogate daughter. He even gave me his most treasured possession— his sword.
    “Get out of my way,” Lord Incubus growled down at me.
    The long scar that ran down the side of his face suddenly became electric blue. A humming noise vibrated through my eardrums, and all of the fighting that was going on around me came to a halt as everybody looked at Lord Incubus as a glowing light erupted from his scar and it lit up the sky.
Lord Incubus stared deeply into my dad’s eyes with the look of a man on a psychotic break. My dad looked back at him, face blank.
    “It was nice of you to join us, President Abraham,” Incubus smirked, his scar returning to it’s normal faded white color once again.
    I whipped my head around to face him.
    “This is my father, not President Abraham,” I told him, my eyebrows knotting together in confusion.
Lord Incubus laughed, “You think this man is your father? Octavia, your parents were banished from the Republic because you’re their daughter.”
    A blinding white flash erupted in the room, causing me to squint my eyes. Once the flash diminished, the figure that should have been my father slowly changed into President Abraham.
    “Banished is better than what you do,” President Abraham retorted.
    President Abraham’s appearance contrasted quite obnoxiously with Incubus’s. Abraham had calming green eyes that held an unknown sort of power. His hair, unlike Incubus’s messy black hair, was gray and trimmed neatly. He wore a robe similar to Incubus’s only in color: a deep and royal purple. President Abraham had broad shoulders that he held himself up with to give an outward appearance of confidence and power.
    “Death is better than being kicked out of society with nowhere to run to,” Incubus fired back.
    “Death is permanent—”
    “So is banishment,” I quietly interrupted the President.
Abraham looked at me, almost as if he was staring right into my soul. In a voice that was slightly taunting, he asked, “And which would you chose, Octavia?”
    Without any hesitation, I answered him,“Death. People remember you when you die because most of the time in this world you die for what you believe in. Banishment is an act used to forget people who have challenged your ways.”
    “Octavia, this is not your battle to fight…” Incubus warned me, his voice uncharacteristically soft.
    “Yes, it is her fight, brother. It has been since the day she was brought into this world,” Abraham scowled.
    Brothers? Incubus and Abraham? This was certainly a family reunion that would be remembered…
    “Octavia Darma has no reason to battle you. This war started five centuries ago, brother. It has gone on long enough,” Incubus stated, his voice full of power.
    I closed my eyes, my eyelashes softly brushing against my skin.. I took a deep breath before quickly opening them up.
In a blink of an eye I pulled out my sword, looking President Abraham straight into his soul.
    The sight of fear painted upon his face gave me a new sense of ecstasy that I had never felt before. My mouth curled into a smirk as I took a few steps forward.
    The next few seconds went by in a blur, but I do remember twisting my sword into the President’s chest, the blood running down his shirt giving me a feeling of comfort. My smirk turned into a crazed grin at the expression of horror that would forever be plastered upon his face. Abraham slumped to the ground with a thump. He died by my sword. I swung the weapon  around in my hand with glee as I turned to face Lord Incubus.
    “Abraham’s death will seem quite merciful compared to what yours is going to be like, Lord Incubus.”