In the expanse of time, there had been several realities from which to draw inspiration from. Melkos Unchanos had existed in between that framework of multiple realities, ever since his discovery at the hands of Siri and her lot, at the cusp of anger and hatred withdrawn into a sense of paternity and godhood. Through those events, everlasting and ever changing, Melkos had grown from a Dark Lord of Destruction into a shining beacon of hope and life; crossing the expanse of hundreds of thousands of years as he slowly and meticulously placed himself as the head of worship for a people who made it possible for him to know and love his Daughter, Siri. An everlasting covenant established in thanks and remembrance for them allowing him a chance to be recovered, to be discovered, to be changed and forever molded into the entity he existed as in the present. While it was true there had been others before Siri, that those Jedi from that other realm of existence had confronted and harshly converted the Dark Lord, it was Siri and, by relation, Jack O'Neill who had truly and utterly converted the hatred within Melkos into a positive energy of creation and renewal. So deep had the change been that the very universe surrounding the inception of this goodness, this positivity had shifted multiple times until at last it had stabilized into what it was today.
Melkos had never forgotten his daughter, Siri O'Neill. The Anagonian's that had provided the avenue upon which he had discovered her, upon which his very soul had been melted down in magma before her and reforged into the creature of darkest light and life that he was now, had also been at the forefront of his thoughts. There had been several incarnations and attempts to rectify the past, to change events and to better futures; explorations of a primitive god as they stretched their powers into the cosmos and altered the perception of reality for their benefit. Ultimately, Melkos had settled on returning to the beginning, some three-hundred thousand years ago. From that point forward he remained a ever-present presence in the development of life in Anagonia, to grow and nurture them and share with them the benevolence that they had fostered in himself through their selfless acts of worship and praise. Era upon era had passed, with the fall of the United Republic and the rise of the Confederacy a culmination of what Melkos had seen as necessary events to continue his promise to his people. In those events, plans began to unfold, far above those of mortal men and beings.
Before, in other timelines, Melkos had made it an effort to be apparent and visible. Through those mistakes he had come to realize that an omnipresent approach, fluid and nebulous as gentle nudges and hints were ushered through the ages. Preparing a society to fix what he had deemed mistakes of the past, in preparation for what he hoped would be a far better future. In that promise, as fluid as it was dynamic in motion, he still had never forgotten Siri O'Neill. So it was that through a series of rather corporal events, down below in Anagonia as it endured as it always had, though now along a better and more direct path, that Melkos once again looked to the past. There, he hoped to find the stretch of time that would lead him again back to his Daughter, as all of his efforts had been undertaken to do. Fixing the timeline, reconnecting and ending, building new bridges and destroying old, all to configure the bigger picture to open a doorway that had seemed oh-so-impossible not but a thousand years before.
Like a ticking clock, moving appropriately forward, so too did Melkos come to understand that time had moved a equal appropriation forward for him to consider the impossible; to reach his Daughter, to find her and fix this damn mess once and for all. He knew that upon doing so, each attempt at restoring what hope he had lost would be sealed forever away, and that this final incarnation of his attempt would be solidified in time. There would be no going back, no returning to the void and fluid time to play the strings of forever to sing another thousand years into existence - or take away an equal amount. He had left Siri back then, upon doing so sealing the fate that would circle around to a point that required him to fix the mess he had started. It was not so much that he wanted to fix it as it was that he truly did miss his daughter, Melkos just knew that upon taking on this venture the circle would end and time would resume its forward motion. In that end, there was things on the past he couldn't change, of which he was sure he couldn't see again, but the one factor in all this that would close the cycle and allow Melkos the future he had created was to step before Siri and finish what had been started when he had been dipped in that hellish magma.
Sovereign Empire of Imperius
Seventh State in the Confederate States of Anagonia
Imperial City, Grand Temple of Drekanity
It amused the dark god that his people referred their faith as "Drekanity". In all the incarnations of these people, through the vast swaths of time, this was the only one that presented such a unique flair to the context of religion and faith so as to provide importance to both Dragons and Death. In their faith, the Drekamythian Dragons were seen as the true heralds and angels of their dark lord, a lord of death and rebirth who had watched over their civilization for countless thousands of years. Melkos had found amusement in that in many of those specific points in time, he had used his draconic creations to be just that - but only subtly so. This time around he had been careful not to interfere too much with his people, to only appear before just a perhaps unimportant few, to not make himself a shield against the folly of mistakes but rather a figure of comfort in the consequence of aftermath of those mistakes. He had learned much from the worlds other different religions, in doing so he had believed he learned the most important of all; children must learn to walk on their own two feet before they can reach their hands up to embrace their Father.
In the Grand Temple of Drekanity, situated near the center of the largest city and Capitol of Imperius, Imperial City, the original designers had constructed a throne room that was all but blocked off from normal traffic. This had been one of Melkos' interventions, a quiet addition at the request of one of the architects. A personal visitation or two had ushered the architect from several thousand years ago to build a room that was separate from all others, but center to the structure like any seat of authority was. Only a particular sect of Drekan Priests were ever allowed down the secret corridors that mated the room with the exterior, and by divine - to an Anagonian - inspiration by Melkos he had this roomed reserved as a resting place for those considered among Melkos' chosen. That architect, Priest Ushka Kindma, was buried in the first of the sarcophagi that would slowly fill the large space at the center of the large structure. Dozens of sarcophagi were before Melkos, his throne constructed against the wall and properly fitting to a size he had found fitting to a more corporal form. In this room he had no fear of others witnessing him, no fear of breaking his vows to himself to interfere, because in this room he was free.
Being a god was not like what the scriptures of other religions had spoken. It was a dedicated experience, once which Melkos had become intimately aware of over the course of his eon-spanning lifetime. There was an underlying, permanent and unmovable force that Melkos had been required to obey and traverse, a power greater than his own that seemed benevolent enough to permit his interference. He had been forced to utter the vows of his intent to that force, in whatever capacity it existed in the sense of the flow of time, insofar that the vows themselves were permanently etched across time for all eternity. In that, his words would trickle down into the hearts of those who worshipped him, inspiring them to write texts and books and eventually found the very religion that would create the very throne he sat upon. It was through these celestial devices that he felt the paternity of love for his worshippers, his creations, those he guided in both evolution and growth; dragons and humans and others all. Before him, then, were the closest of these worshippers, those who had seen him or thought to have seen visages of his spectral, dark and skeletal form. Over a hundred sarcophagi lay before him, with space for a thousand more if permitted, dotting the room of the massive structure. A darkened tomb sealed permanently from light, visible only to the spectral eyes of the god that inspired its construction.
It was for a purpose that he permitted and requested this rooms construction; sacred as it was, a resting place for saints of the faith. It was a reminder to him of each time he visited someone, showed himself, the consequences thereof and the responsibility that he held for the life he forever altered from the natural order. There was some saints in here that had been burned at the stake at one time for attempting to claim they saw him. In that first instance of such, Melkos had appeared before a dozen people then, proclaiming that they had slain his chosen one of the time without cause. All of those dozen along with that saint had been buried here, their lives forever altered as well. There were others wrongfully killed, but eventually after enough visitations, Drekanity shifted to accept things, to sense that feeling, to listen to Melkos in their silent places for his confirmation. They had learned, but had not given up on their humanity. All of those that he had personally impacted were here, all of the lives he had altered and disallowed from a normal progression, all of them humbling reminders to the risk and consequence of the path he had chosen.
In the darkness without light, the corporal form of Melkos Unchanos shifted on his throne. His ethereal dark cloak, broken in patches to reveal the human-like skeleton underneath, wafted and waved in a nonexistent breeze. The one and only source of the rooms illumination provided by the two red, dim orbs of light that existed within the eye sockets of the skull that resided within the hood of the cloaked figure. The dim hue lit up the expanse of the room, his eyes traversing here and there, examining names and epitaph's of those now deceased. His posture was that of a leaning man, one elbow on the arm of the throne, open skeletal palm carefully holding up the tired and weak looking skull as the spectral eyes gazed onward into the abyss. Time had not been friendly to Melkos, but neither did it take away the entirety of his form. Soon, he knew, even the skeleton of his old life would fade away, leaving only the cloak of his prior existence to house his divinity unto these Anagonians. That in itself was part of the process he had chosen, a process that started for what felt like eons ago on a particular planet, a moon perhaps, where he slid into magma and chose to change himself for his daughter forever.
"Siri," the words uttered from non-existent lips. His voice surprisingly soft, an elf-man once, a Dark Lord of some eternal Force turned for the better by the very woman whose name he had just uttered. "Where are you?"
The question left those lips, wafting onto the frames of the room, then beyond to the sky. There they traversed the endless time, back to a point where perhaps they could be heard. His desire to meet his daughter so great that unintentionally had he opened a doorway to the past, or perhaps the present, or maybe even the future. Time was fickle in these things, it only cared about matching the words with the full intent of the soul that could understand and hear them - for what use would it be if words uttered in time met those of a senseless beast who could not understand? As the flow of time circled, so too did the words, searching the expanse of forever for the ear to listen to the call; a father who quietly wished to see his daughter, whose thoughts of concern and love had created intent, upon which time itself tried to rectify and finally provide a solution.
Back on the throne the aging god's eyes closed. He rested a bit, though rest in the biological term eluded him. His thoughts on his daughter, the moment of his change, and the aftermath that would lead him to almost betray that paternal calling to her. A single tear was shed, equally corporal but slightly less so, sliding down the cheek of a form that no longer existed to neither support nor create it. There in those thoughts and sadness, time stood still.
