Fiction:Elysia Lost

Chapter One
The Epirote's mind stirred. For the first time in three millenia, vague inklings of thought occured. Neurons flashed as his preserved, half-deceased state leapt into true living once more. First it was his brain. Then his heart. Lungs. Ears.

The soft sounds of glass crackling, and tinkling. Calm before the storm. His eyes shot open, a cascade of frozen glass exploded in front of him, and the first sensation he would feel in three-thousand years was millions of tiny shards, cutting at his skin. He rolled out of pile of shattered glass, spraying cold beads of water from his wet skin to the floor. He wiped his watery eyes with a bloodied hand. He was alone.

The... room, the man figured, was very dark, like a cave. But as his eyes adjusted to the dim light thrown from curious glowing red bars, at around head-level, he realised the room was made of iron. Painfully, the man came to a stand, and stumbled this way and that to walk off his pain. He looked around-- the room was mostly featureless, except its iron walls, and the curious iron alcove he fell out from. It, too, was lit by curious red rods which were warm to the touch. The alcove had a pool of now-lukewarm water at its bottom. He stared at the device, devoid of understanding. He could remember nothing.

To his right, at the far end of the room, he saw a flat black tile that was curiously set beside a vast gate of iron come alight with a pale blue. The light it threw was feeble, even compared to the red rods. But it was noticeable. And it was strangely upsetting. Slowly, the Epirote crept towards the glowing tile. Looking down with astonished eyes he saw... writing?

In his search to identify the script, his memory began to return. He had learned how to write Greek from his family's slave, which had been bought by his father many years earlier, mostly for that purpose. The slave's name, he recalled, was Harmon. His? His was... Was...

Timonax.

He stopped flipping through his mental catalogue of scripts, the memories were all too much. Alexander's army, in which he was among its most formidable Phalangists, was in India. It was coming to a close, and the celebrating men were often unruly. Perhaps, he had gotten far too drunk last night, and was thrown into an exotic holding cell. The Gods only know what could be found in these exotic parts. It was a reassuring thought, in a strange way, that he was only going to be berated half-heartedly by who were on-paper his superiors. In reality, he had earned their respect, and in many cases had far more experience in the field than them. They would forgive a transgression such as this.

Chuckling, Timonax slammed on the iron gate with a fist;

"Tebaeus! Tebaeus!" he hollered. Tebaeus was almost always assigned to guard duty such as this-- not a very dignified job, but perhaps that's what he got for not being much of a careful drinker himself.

"Hey Tebaeus! Whoever has been assigned here! What happened last night to get me in this brig!?" He waited eagerly for a smarmy response, but it never came. Timonax's grin began to fade.

"...Hello?" He waited, waited until his frustration boiled into impotent rage. A fist slammed against the glowing, script-adorned tile. Heavy locks immediately unhinged, startling the Greek. The iron gates then dragged themselves open, disappearing into the walls with no mechanism apparent.

Timonax stumbled through to the now-open doorway, and was greeted with the same iron walls as before only with much larger dimensions The curious rods along the walls were a brilliant, irritating white, washing the room in stark light. He felt his throat dry up. Carefully, he stepped into the larger room.

Entering a chamber now fully illuminated, what might have first caught his attentino was the brilliance of the iron - it was tarnished, but though the tarnish the metal was bright. Timonax felt the sides of the wall with his bloodied hand, calloused, thick fingers running along it. This wasn't a prison-- it was a palace.

"What...?" The confusion, the total lack of understanding returned. He stared at the far side of the opulent room-- another door (to the cockpit). He stepped toward it, but stopped. Where is my equipment? he asked himself. He cocked his head about, looking for a clue. If he was to face... whatever lay beyond that iron gate, he wanted to be armed and fed.

His eyes fell on an iron box, about half his height. It seemed amazingly heavy-- not to mention expensive-- but it was about the only identifiable thing in the room meant for storage. Timonax stepped up to it, more confident this time. He studied the box carefully. Made of similar metal to the walls, and decorated in flowing patterns of brass, the lid was held shut by two latches, their fronts were flat and smooth and there was no sign of anything like a keyhole or a lock-- No lock he'd ever seen before anyhow. The patterns danced around t oencircle a plague on the box, on this plaque was a carved set of characters he had never seen before. Having given up on identifying the strange script, he used his considerable strength, built up by a life of war, to tug on one of the strange, lock-like latches. Nothing happened. Not even the slightest budge, no sign that he was shifting anything, but as his hand pressed the flat, there was a heavy "click" from the lock, and with further tugs he could feel something moving inside.

The Greek began tugging more, and faster-- it was beginning to wear him out, but he felt like he was making progress at last.The latch didn't move much further but the source could be felt. Both locks needed to open, the other lock needed to be opened, Timonax realised. He wrapped his other hand around the other latch, and gave it a hard tug. As his palm unlocked the second lock, a hard tug from him opened the box to reveal the contents inside.

His eyes brightened. His linothorax-- bleached white armour, made of layered linen and flax with fine bronze scales around its midsection-- was the first thing he saw. Eagerly he yanked it out, noticing that it seemed... utterly sterile. It struck him as odd-- he cleaned his armour regularly, yes, but not only was nobody else so much as allowed to touch it, it seemed tidier, and cleaner than it was the day he bought it. He reached in, grabbing his helmet, a bronze Phyrigian that was characteristically worn and battered from eleven years of war and use-- polished into a mirror now. His kopis, a topheavy sword of fine iron was, too, cleaned of imperfection. He looked down to his equipment, refurbished, apparently, by the world's finest artisans, and then back to the door to the far side. He would have to push his suspicions aside for later, as he figured-- correctly, as it would turn out-- they were the least of his worries.