A Song for the Dead 
By Richard Drysdale

* * *

In the broad light of day, beneath a brightly shining sky, a killing
is taking place.

>From my vantage point I watch as those involved go through the 
motions. The one who will die is putting up a brave show of defiance,
she obviously intends to fight on until she can fight no longer and
take down as many of her foes as possible.

If she can that is.

The fight is completely one sided and unfair. Even a complete fool
would know that a fight of five against one will not be won by the
one. This does not even consider the disparity between the powers of
the combatants, any one of the five possesses more than five fold the
power of their victim.

They do not have to do this. All they need do is restrain their 
opponent or capture her in any one of a dozen ways.

That is not their way though. They have never captured any of the
opponents they fought, instead they have slaughtered each and every
last one of them.

As they are doing to this one.

I watch as the doomed woman strikes out at her killers, an attack
intended to ensnare and slow down her adversaries catching one off
guard. The remaining four yell in concern at the sight of one of their
number pinned against the wall.

I know that this would be killer could not have suffered more than
minor bruises at worst, yet her companions act as if it were the end
of the world. With renewed vigor they attack together, acting in
concert to slay the woman.

Desperately she leaps to one side, barely avoiding searing fire, then
ducks just in time to avoid being decapitated by a razor sharp disc.
Her green eyes are wide with fear, yet still she futilely attempts to
avoid her fate.

She knows that there is no change of escape and that her best efforts
are proving useless. Despite this, or maybe because of it, she fights
on.

Then she makes her last mistake. While attempting to disable another
of the attackers she turns her back on one of the others and is
punished for this blunder.

I close my eyes as a beam of energy lances out into the back of the
woman. She does not even have a chance to scream as her body is
reduced to less than dust.

The worst of it is what occurs once they have won. Their leader, the
one who had struck the final blow, crows her victory with two words.
They echo in my mind like a blasphemy which I can not forgive.

Then they free their compatriot and leave. None of them spare a single
glance at where they had just killed the woman.

Once I was sure they had left I came out from my hiding place. With
sorrow in my heart and rage at this murder I walked to where the woman
had died.

Quietly, but putting power to my words, I began to sing. I sang of the
one who had died, letting the words flow into me as the woman's
shattered spirit told me what to say.

My song confirmed her life, speaking of all she had done both good and
bad. As I continued the shattered soul began to coalesce as I lent it
the energy to do so. The song came to an end and the woman stood
before me once more, visible only to my eyes.

Her body was still gone yet her spirit once more whole. She opened her
insubstantial eyes, focusing them on me and screamed a scream of pure
terror. If she had been alive it would have shattered windows and made
dogs howl for miles around. As she was dead it was less audible than
the sound of a breeze.

Standing there I did nothing to defend myself as she clawed at me with
ethereal fingers no more solid than the wind. Patiently I waited the
long minutes as her rage slowly exhausted herself.

Finally her attacks ceased and I began my song once more, this time
filling it with joy. I sang her life and death and in doing so allowed
her tormented soul to slip away peacefully to its final reward.

I waited for a moment once the song was ended and she had departed,
ensuring that nothing remained to pull her back to this world which
she was no longer part of.

As I left I could still hear in my mind those joyful words which
proclaimed another thinking being had been successfully slaughtered.

"Moon dusted!"

* * *

Did anybody find that interesting? Did you guess what series it was
before the last line?

This is only the first draft so C&C in any form will be grateful 
accepted.

- Richard Drysdale (merior@wintermute.co.uk)