The air calls to him. The wind of Tephra pulls urgently at his feathers, begging him to take to the skies. The feeling is familiar, so he does not question it as he allows a few wide sweeps of his wings to pull him from the blackened shoreline of his home. It becomes curiouser, though, when he finds his flight path taking him away from the volcanic peninsula and into the meadow. As he soars through thermals of cooler wind, his auburn skin shivers with the frigid cold that has taken over elsewhere as autumn arrives. His eyes are bright yet slightly unsure; he cannot understand why his mind and body pull him here (it had been ages since he had last been in a common, neutral land).

Warrick is searching for something, he realizes. He cannot find it in the skies, so with gentle tilting of the outer feathers, he turns and spirals downwards towards the now-golden grasses of the meadow. His hooves hit the ground solidly, then tucking the large span of his navy wings into his sides. With a huff, the stallion glances around curiously, his lips pulled into a thin line. The meadow is eerily quiet and still, as if hushed by the departing of the warmer weather. He will soon realize that the world around him is quiet for an entirely different reason.

The clouds he had just flown through now grumble with motion and life; but there is no sign of an oncoming storm in such dry weather. The wind picks up - cool and frigid against his sleek skin - and he shivers, glancing up to the sky. His salt-dried forelock flutters across his face, staring up into the heavens like he has done his entire life. He has learned to expect no answer, just silence - but now, he is being summoned.

The Overseer’s features are slack and full of wonder as the clouds form into an equine from nothingness, speaking deeply and truly from the depths of twilight. It speaks his name, this omnipresent being, and it calls to his soul as if it has known him for a lifetime. Warrick swallows, his gaze unwavering as the clouds move and breathe, thinking immediately of Orani, of his sister, of his family. There is only one question in his mind that has been unanswered since their disappearance years ago on the mountain. There are others -
a nameless father Orani never spoke of, among other things.

“Where is my family?” He finally asks, his voice small compared to that of the god, but unwavering and clear.

Little did he know that family is right in front of him.

Warrick

The Overseer is not surprised that it is the heavens that call down to him. Orani had always told him stories of the starlight and galaxies as a child, and how his family is spun from the very fabric of the cosmos. He can feel his heart leap with anticipation, the swell of suspense nearly palpable as the meadow breathes to life beneath the rolls of cloud and gentle rumbling of thunder. There is laughter from the nameless god and it shakes the foundation of the earth, quaking beneath Warrick’s hooves. The stallion keeps his balance, the wind pulling his salt-dried mane and forelock away from his slack-jawed expression, his cerulean eyes wide with wonder as he stares up at the being. The laughter is not benevolent as it reverberates through the meadow; somehow it is callous, almost cruel.

As the sentient god speaks again, a prickle of uncertainty tugs at him inwardly. Not enough for Warrick to disregard anything that had been said, but enough to exude caution in his next few words. This is it - this moment, the bay stallion knew, will be the moment that defines all moments.

‘Your mother, who can say, or care? But your father, well...you are looking at him.’

Warrick can feel his knees quiver at the being’s confession. He nearly could have stumbled, fallen to the ground in both awe and despair. The Overseer doesn’t, however, but there is a lightheadedness that comes over him that makes him sway beneath the clouds, head swimming. It all made sense, it all aligned with everything he had been told by Orani - there was no reason not to believe him. His father has to be a god, one of the cosmos and starlight, of black matter and planets and galaxies who has returned to allow Warrick a semblance of peace to put a face and a name with what once used to be a nameless, faceless idea. His mind swims with questions, though he has no idea that diving deeper into his lineage would reveal more than he would ever want to know.

“Father,” he breathes, though it is almost a question as it passes through his cobalt lips. It cannot be, can it? Oh, but it is - alive and breathing before him, in all of his glory. There is almost as sense of pride that washes over him, to know that his father is no ordinary man but fashioned from stars themselves. A cosmic entity, a powerful being - and his blood runs in Warrick’s viens. “Who are you? Where is Orani, Beyah? Why was I left here alone?” Why are you all a part of the stars, but I remain?

He leaves his questioning there; questions that once plagued him many years ago and were left to lay dormant in his mind, because he knew there would be no answers. But now...now, there just might be.

Warrick

‘You weren’t worthy.’

The phrase that had drowned his soul since the moment they disappeared - a phrase that he had worked so hard to close tightly and ignore - now plagues his mind with full force, slapping him in the face. It is as if time hadn’t closed the wound at all, but now the sutures are ripped open by the sky-God’s words, and the blood begins to pour again, slowly and painfully. His face breaks, the reality of it heavily slamming into each feature - in his eyes, his mouth, the sharp lines of his jaw. You lie, he tells his father, the cruel man in the sky, but he cannot believe himself even as the words cross his mind. He knew it was the truth; he had known it back then, and even though time had allowed him to forget, he remembers it now just as vividly.

‘She left because you weren’t worthy.’

Warrick can feel the sway in his legs as he manages to keep himself upright, the awe that had once filled him for this God-king (his father) slowly leaving him as the cold feeling of foreboding twists in his stomach, no longer wrapped in reverence but a feeling of sickness. His cerulean eyes are wide with disbelief, but he does nothing to attempt to correct the swirling mass of cloud and stars. He did not have it in him to protest, because his heart silently sings: Told you so, told you so.

‘Who am I?’

His his head is swimming, feeling dizzy as his eyes continue to remain steadily on the figure above him, a pained expression on his face. Did he want to know, now? Did it matter who is father was, truly? It is too late now, to turn back and run, and his legs feel like lead in the meadow grasses, melting into the earth slowly.

“I am Carnage.”

The bay stallion can taste the acrid bile on his tongue, his once sorrow-filled eyes narrowing with not only distrust but with the soft embers of growing rage. “You lie!” This time his words come to life in his mouth as he spits them at the mass of swirling clouds and galaxies, unfurling his wings. There is no way that Carnage is his father - he knew of Carnage, of the terrible feats and torture given by the dark God, and knowing of him, Warrick knew that he is also the God of lies. Bravely (stupidly, fueled by adrenaline and anger, and the knowledge of Tangerine’s captivity by him) his large wings beat heavily at his sides, pulling himself from the ground and attempting to meet this Dark-God face to face.

“You lie,” he tells him again, his wings bringing him closer and closer to Carnage. There is no doubt this is him - the dark God that has plagued Beqanna since the very beginning - but there is no way he is Warrick’s father. There is no way that his blood could be part of the epitome of darkness and shadow, no way that he is in relation to such evil.

Warrick

The God - Carnage, his father - grows impatient, thunder rumbling idly within the bellows of the cloud and lightning that roil and illuminate beneath it. Warrick can feel a similar feeling boiling inside his own soul, though it is nothing compared to the ferocity or power of the being that presents itself before him. The osprey-King is defenseless, save for the feeble accusation that sputters from his lips, but he nevertheless faces the God-King with a pridefulness that could easily be his own undoing. It is not possible and Warrick would not accept it - there is no way that the blood of Carnage runs in his veins, the one who took eyes out of his closest friends and succumbed Tangerine into a chamber of torture. 

It cannot be possible.

But there is - within the anger of his auburn face and gritting of his teeth as he hovers and darts before Carnage’s eyes - a glimmer of hesitancy, of unsureness. A flicker of doubt, suppressed behind adrenaline and rage, but enough that Carnage easily finds it, and holds onto it with a dark and terrible grip. Words are merely words as they come from the lips of a false god, and Warrick holds his unwavering gaze as he riddles off about Orani. The stallion’s lips tremble with anger and his blood pulsates vividly beneath his skin, silent. It’s when the thundercloud-stallion brings up Tangerine - a very real being, who he indeed suffered at Carnage’s mighty power, that he could no longer bear it. He’s nearly done with the whole act - a god like Carnage could prattle on about many things and still be a liar, so it is not until images play before him that Warrick’s aggression begins to fade, leaving a wide-eyed boy staring into the depths of despair. 

Orani was unmistakable, even if only created out of memory. He is not longer the Overseer, but a child as her appearance fades in and out before him. But Carnage has defiled the memory, ruined it for the sake of a laugh. 

“Enough,”

Warrick’s voice is deep and solemn, his cerulean eyes hooded beneath his furrowed brow. But Carnage has not had enough, and quickly the image changes as Carnage’s own memories of Tangerine are set before him, to relive them not only in Tangerine’s mind but now in his own. It plays out differently, seeing it instead of only imagining what she had told him - how he had lured her, how she had gone to him…

Everything you have, was mine first.

White hot anger and hatred - something that Warrick has never truly felt until now - boils over and turns him blind.

“Enough!”

He bellows, propelling himself forward into the only figure of Carnage (of his father) that he knew. There is no logical reasoning or thought behind it as he sends himself into the fray (would Carnage dissipate, would he die?) but the outcomes didn’t matter, nothing mattered;

not anymore. 

Warrick