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It sailed on a sea of primordial matter, tossing and turning with the waves. It was helpless, like a tumbleweed in a gale. There was nothing to grab hold of, no solid matter to stop its momentum. Just a violent current that carried it away from all it had ever known and loved. 

Though the waves of chaos it could glimpse others like it. They, too, thrashed in the roiling mass and wailed with voiceless throats. The waves swallowed them, dragged them under and spat them back out, tormenting them. It wanted to scream, pluck itself from this nightmare and fly away. Anywhere else, for anywhere was better than here. It was about to cry out, but then it saw.

The sphere was enormous, dwarfing it and all the other souls being pulled towards its great blue mass. For a moment, it forgot about the primordial waves that tugged and beat it. The sphere commanded its attention, the only thing of color in the blackness. The only real, tangible, recognizable thing. It reached out with desperate hands. Then it realized that the waves had passed and they carried the other souls away to that blue surface.

It was afraid and alone. The void was cold and empty. Its vast darkness held the great sphere captive, along with the souls. These thoughts brought distress to it and it tried to shy away, although there was nowhere to hide. What was it to do alone in such nothingness? How could it exist like this?

A voice like rolling thunder shook it out of its reflection. It looked up into a singular great eye and it stared back, penetrating its consciousness. The words the bearer of that eye spoke shook it to the core. It did not understand them at first, and only made it more afraid. But then a realization started to form in whatever passed for its brain.

Those other souls that had been cast down to the sphere - they were like it, terrified and helpless in the chaos of this domain. Like it, they had the barest sense of self. No worth, no comfort to take refuge in. 

Without a purpose they were lost. 

Without.

[i]Virtue.[/i]

It looked to that all-seeing eye once more. There was a clarity in that glassy surface. Its gaze commanded him and he understood, for he was a [i]he[/i]. A man of strength, without and within. A beacon, an arbiter, a rock, a leader. He stood, suddenly proud of things he had done, and of things he had yet to do. He glowed in the blackness of the void, a torch to guide the souls of that sphere - Galbar. He needed fear no longer, and neither did they. He would give them something to live for. 

He was aware of others like him, left by the waves. A chosen few, selected from the host of nameless ones that hurled towards Galbar. He knew they were special and that each would add something to that mass of blue. Some were valuable. Some were not. 

He scanned his fellows, a base understanding of each coming to him as he did so. Some of them lingered, some were already boarding their stars, taking off for realms beyond. But his gaze locked with one, bright and beautiful. An understanding dawned between them, a wordless bond, a vision.

With a smile, Aelius approached.