Winter 2045 ~ Underworld
Allison Fae-McCallum
Allison had hiked up the side of a mountain with strength and tenacity she hadn’t known she had. The motivation she held onto tightly kept her moving more than any physical restraint had on her. She had been following the small voice she had been hearing since arriving in the Underworld.
The ground was so strange here—there was a noticeable difference in the texture underfoot, it was almost like she were walking on a hollow surface. As if the echoes of her footsteps clambered and rang out underneath repeatedly.
You have almost reached your destination.
She recognized it as the voice of Egregore, and she envisioned the face of her grandfather and closed her eyes.
“What can you tell me about him? Surely you knew him,” she said aloud as she continued to climb.
You might find it hard to believe, but I hardly knew him either. When I was alive I lived alone for a long, long time. Orphanages were my home until the world got harder to live in.
“How much harder could it have been?”
We had our own issues—the world was a dangerous place. It was as if people forgot about everything except self-survival. We did not foster a lot of common ground for others to forge new relationships. It wasn’t impossible, those that really sought out bonds with each other were able to do so in spite of the circumstances, not because of them.
“You sound like you don’t want to return things to the way they were,” Allison said.
They are the way they were. Just because time has passed doesn’t mean that the world has changed. The people here are similar—the ones that search out for friendship will find themselves attracting like minds. They will find themselves earning the care they have searched so long for, and yet, there will always be hardship. Blood will spill, and there will be wonder of what kind of creator could let such tragedy to occur.
“I refuse to accept that tragedy and suffering is inevitable,” she said.
Acceptance isn’t endorsement. It is inevitable that pain and tragedy would paint this world as it would the world before, that doesn’t negate any of the beauty and the wonder that can spring from that pain.
“I...guess I agree with that. I’m surprised to hear that you feel so strongly about opposing the Creatures of the Night’s goals.”
I have an inherent disdain for those who choose to continue the suffering of others for the betterment of themselves. Those who self survive through the pain of others. Those are the people that are the same as those that ruined my world. Those that took my parents from me. Those that took from those who had nothing else to give. I will form a pact with anybody who has the same desire to burn those kinds of people away.
Allison thought on this as she reached the top of the trail—it sprawled out to an overlook that crested over a drop that led deeper down into a valley—mountains sat on either edge leaving one true path to walk, but first came the drop. It looked like it was too high to simply fall down to avoid coming unscathed, but she did see a rocky section of the wall a few feet down that she could reasonably make the effort for a climb down.
As she turned and took her first step down her mind began running. Rosie and Josie flashed across her mind’s eye. Lilly and her final moments—George and Jaclyn Fae—throughout everything they deserved better. They deserved better circumstances so they could have all had better lives. She was the one thing they all had in common and she was hellbent on making sure she could do everything in her power to change the world for the better.
She leaned down and reached out with her leg to get her bearings and take the first step down. The terrain was steep and unforgiving, with loose rocks and gravel scattered everywhere. The sound of it tumbling down the side of the cliff didn’t speak highly of the descent. Allison's heart raced as she carefully navigated her way down, trying to find stable footing with each step. The wind whipped around her, sending her hair flying in all directions. She took a sharp breath as she closed her eyes to steel her nerves.
She didn't have any rock climbing equipment, so she had to rely solely on her own strength and agility to make her way down the mountain.
Didn’t have any…
Her eyes opened wide and she cursed herself for not trying it sooner. Stupid. Things like this will get you killed. She slowly took her left hand off the rock she was grappling and took a deep breath while she made the motion to conjure a harness and tether. Her hand made the motion…but nothing happened in response.
I do not wish to alarm you, but I am not sensing the abilities you normally have with summoning objects other than Ichaival. It seems that may have been left with your other self.
Other self. Jace…
She closed her eyes. She hoped he was safe, she hated that she was separated from him, but hoped through everything that the powers could do well to help keep him safe.
You have lost a fundamental power you have used to survive up to this point, and your first thought is grace that it will help keep him safe?
“Do you have a problem with that?”
Of course not. I am...proud. I don’t claim to be the existence that currently is your father, I still say that that man is dead, but as the existence who has the memories of your father...I am proud of the person you have become a person your father would have wanted to be himself.
Allison felt a knot in her stomach as she re-grabbed her hold on the rock and she swallowed hard. Someone my father would have wanted to be himself. Someone he would be proud of. All her life she had convinced herself that those words would not affect her negatively searching in vain for feelings that would never come, yet...when she was here and forced to come to terms with them, they made her happy. She was glad. It didn’t make up for the years she had to find her own way, alone. She didn’t think anything would, but she wouldn’t deprive herself of feeling good about something that made normal people with normal parents happy.
Normal people probably never had to worry about their parents not being around to be proud of them. What kind of life that must present for them. I can’t even imagine the opportunities that would open up.
Allison gazed up at the towering mountain looming over her. She knew that the climb down to the valley below would be a long and arduous journey, and not just physically considering current circumstances, but she steeled herself for the challenge ahead.
With a deep breath, she set out on the trail, her feet pounding against the rocky ground as she started her descent. The path was steep and treacherous, with loose rocks and gravel threatening to send her tumbling down the mountainside at any moment. As she continued down, her muscles began to ache with exertion, and her breath came in short, labored gasps. Her chest began to spike with the beginning prickles of hot pain, but she was able to push it aside as she kept going, putting one foot in front of the other as she descended deeper and deeper into the valley.
The wind whipped around her, tugging at her hair and clothes as she clambered down the rugged terrain. Her palms grew sweaty as she gripped onto the rocky outcroppings, trying to find a stable foothold. She knew one mistake was all it took to send everything to void—to set the deck back to zero and kill any chance she had of making it out of here alive.
As the hours ticked by, Allison felt her energy starting to flag. She had known it was going to be a labored climb down, but the physical and mental strain of the long climb was starting to take its toll. Her thoughts began to turn to giving up, to turning back and returning to the safety of the mountaintop.
But she refused to let herself be defeated. With grit and determination, she pushed herself onward, one step at a time. Each step was another foot closer to the bottom. The valley floor seemed impossibly far away, but she could see the glimmering ribbon of a river in the distance, a sign that she was making progress.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity of descent, Allison's feet touched down on the valley floor. She let out a gasp of relief that turned into a scream of jubilation. She let her other foot make contact with the ground and she let go entirely and let herself fall back, laughing as she collapsed onto the ground. The hit was hard, but she didn’t care. She had made it down and was still alive. She was laughing and took deep gulps of fresh air—thinking she was thankful for each microsecond.
Now that you have made it down below, I think the sense of Egregore’s third eye has increased.
“Increased?”
I am sensing it closer. It’s like it is sending out a distress signal to you.
“That is the vibe I have been getting from it as well.”
I think it might be prudent for you to probe for information if it is willing to receive it.
“Now you’re speaking my language,” Allison said.
It seems we are still a ways away even though it is closer.
“In that case, do you mind if I ask you something?” Allison asked.
I cannot guarantee a satisfactory answer, but if I can muster it I shall provide whatever I can.
“My mother...I learned recently of her, but not nearly enough. Do you have memories of her?”
There was a silence as she continued on the trail through the valley. Sticks and underbrush from the few lush trees that stuck nearby crunched as she stepped.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
I do have some memory of her, but I fear that most of the memories surrounding your mother are with Ormus. Part of me worried about telling you this because I didn’t want that fact to deter you from the inevitability from our pact.
Allison said nothing in response.
I am choosing to tell you because I care about you knowing above all else. And I think in the end I will make the right decision. Your mother was a firebrand, and I mean that in the most positive way. She was…an outcast. And I mean that in the most endearing of ways. She was not a popular kid when she was young. She treasured the friendships she made—and she fought like hell to keep them. If you had become her friend, she would have fought against God for you.
Allison stopped walking and looked down at her own hands. Seeing the life she lived echoed in her own parents—like before, it wasn’t enough to forgive everything, but there was something to be said about knowing that she was carrying on a sort of legacy.
Iris was bold when others held back. She believed in justice when others had long forgotten it. She was an inspiration to any who got to know her. She was special. She was…
Leptous trailed off as if in thought on memories long not spoken of. Allison continued walking and it wasn’t for a few minutes that it continued.
You remind me a lot of her. You have a similar tenacity, and I think she would be proud to know you have taken her name. I think she probably would have words why you didn’t have her name before, but it would take some talking down to realize the series of events.
This made her laugh—and she stopped to contemplate the hypothetical conversation that would stem from such a topic. Such a laugh felt natural and...she just kept laughing.
...Are you alright? Have you suffered a manic break?
“No,” she finished, wiping a tear from her cheek. “No, I just haven’t laughed like that in a while. Imagining her like that—it kind of reminds me of an old friend. I’m glad she and her were so alike.”
You are so much like her, but you take a lot from…
“You can take credit. Even if you aren’t the full existence of my father, you are part. I think that’s important enough.”
...you have inherited a lot from me, and not the parts I regret,”
“That you know.”
That is fair, but I hope that what I don’t is not too damaging to your self consciousness.
“Anything that has has been worked out.”
I wish it could have been under better circumstances, but I am happy that you feel such.
“Yeah…I do think I am on the road to being better,” she said. She stopped walking as she came across a turn that led upward to a cave hollowed out of the side of the mountain. “I am feeling him in here.”
I am feeling the same. Tread with caution.
Allison nodded and moved aside a few of the twisting branches and began the slow ascent up to the mouth of the cave. The roof looked to drip down as if it had voracious teeth—threatening to release and bite anything that dared enter.
Entering the cave, Allison’s vision adjusted from the change in light as the only natural light was that which spilled in from the mouth. She saw the path inside continued down a curve to the left which led to a decline. She followed it down until the voice in the back of her mind started to feel closer. She took a deep breath and moved forward.
There, at the innermost corner of the cave sat the eye which slowly looked over to Allison as she approached. The movement made her shudder.
Allison. You have come.
“You’re Egregore, am I right? Or at least, the third eye of Egregore?”
That is correct. I had heard talk of you amongst my siblings. And I admit you have been a topic of much conversation, at least, before things fell through.
Allison raised a brow as she approached closely. “Fell through?”
There was a massive fight...twenty three years ago. The Children of the Night have fractured—gone their separate ways. Like shooting stars across a blanket cosmos. I have surveilled my siblings so I may yet help eventually mend broken bridges.
“I see. What was the big fight over? I apologize for how things went—I was not aware—I have been so out of the loop.” Allison hoped Egregore was not capable of reading minds—she was sure that he would be able to call her bluffs very easily. It seemed like Egregore was so open to talk about things he probably had been waiting to tell someone for so long. She would make the most of the opportunity.
Allison. Your father...I have had dreams of him, and thus, of you.
This was not what she had asked, but yet she was still intrigued. “Dreams?”
The subject of dreams came up on that day all those years ago. We were summoned...we were told by Samael, the second eldest of us all that our Father had been killed. The murder was pinned on our youngest—Issachar and Sakonna. I’m sure you are aware of those two.
“They were accused of killing your...father? I’m sorry, I’m having a little trouble understanding.”
Our father...our creator. He drew us to life and he has led us on our journey so that we may see the lives we used to live be returned to us. We’ve worked our entire existences in this world under his care and effort. It is a major unsettlement that he has been killed. Unfortunately, this fact was not the only topic of the meeting. It seems it was combined as a revelation of some...distrustful manners stemming from Ormus—your father.
The fact that Egregore thinks of Ormus solely as your father shows how limited his knowledge truly is.
Leptous had sent the thought to her brain, it seems Egregore had not heard it, as he continued on uninterrupted.
We learned that Ormus has not been forthcoming with us. We started to dream of the people we used to be—lives previously only known to us for the fact of their loss. We previously knew nothing of the lives that came before—we could not even be sure we acted as the same people. For all we knew, we were blank slates…for all we knew.
“You said my father lied to you?” Allison asked. She figured she would get right to the heart of it.
I didn’t believe it at first. Some of the others had dreams they said, but it is very easy to convince yourself of something happening—I assumed that was all this was. I have since had dreams myself. I saw the face I used to have—but crucial memories are still lost to me. I know so little still, but it is distinctly more than before. I had also seen your father...and I know I had known him in the time before. The details are...murky. But I then saw you. I saw you and saw how you looked so much like him, and how you both looked like me.
Allison was silent. She did not want to offer up the idea that she knew more than she looked like she did. It was important to make the distinction that just like Ormus—this wasn’t her grandfather, but one half of the person who used to be her grandfather. His Elemantic was still out there somewhere—the part of him that would have memory of her—if such a thing existed.
“I understand there was a huge fight that splintered you all, but how did your eye end up here?” Allison asked.
I admit, it was not a decision made after deliberation. Everything was happening so fast—the fight was erupting and one of our kind, Ezrael, had constructed a portal. I believe there was some interference and it changed the end destination of the portal—and another of us, Gardov—the closest in me to age in this world—fell inside. He was changed by the journey, I did not want to lose him forever—I still believed that I could reunite us. If he went somewhere that my main body could not travel to...I couldn’t risk it. I sent my in after him. It turns out my suspicions were correct, and he did land some place where my main body could not reach him. To my dismay, my eye has been trapped here as you see.
“And here you remain,” Allison said.
Here I remain.
“Now, I am curious of one last thing...why are you telling me all of this? Not to say I’m not thankful—you wouldn’t imagine the amount of people I’ve come across that haven’t been as forthcoming with information, but I was led to believe that your missions were all of the highest secrecy imaginable. Wouldn’t you be posing a risk to the overall goal by telling me so many things?”
I know why you are here, sweet child. I understand your desire to live against our mission.
“And you still told me anyway?”
There was a silence in the cave for a moment, and Leptous spoke up in her mind.
This has become interesting.
I did not expect the side effects of being separated from my third eye for so long. I hadn’t ever attempted anything like it previously, so I assumed that it would have been fine. It has been...difficult, to say the least. As it stands now, I am unable to stand from where I last laid myself to rest three days ago. We do not eat to continue to exist in this state, but stagnation is as much as a death as any other. I was anticipating a prolonged existence where I endlessly wonder if my siblings will be able to accomplish our goal or whether they will be stopped and put to final peace as I have found. Either outcome is favorable, I think.
“So, you’re waiting to die?” Allison asked.
I will not die, but I will certainly not be living. I will be here...watching. Waiting. And as I sit here, I realize I desire only one thing at the end of my rope. Allison, you seek to end me, and I seek the end. I know you have a mission ahead of you, just like my siblings to—just like I did. I want you to follow your mission to its very end. If you will have tried your very hardest, even if you stop our plans...I will be happy.
Allison began to look down at the eye with a look of sorrow. “I didn’t expect this would be how you felt. I was expecting to argue—to have to fight against you.”
I dreamt of you, Allison. I know at one point there was a family bond between us. I don’t know if I knew you—I was dead long before you were born, but had I known you were my legacy upon my rebirth, I would have chosen against our plan to see your adventure through to its end.
Allison, I think it is time to give him what he desires. Anything further and I believe you both will end up scarred from having to perform.
“I understand,” Allison said. It had been to both of the halves of her family here, and she closed her eyes. “I will pity we never got to meet, but I shall give you that peace that which you ask for. I hope you can forgive the journey I must take for your siblings—the other Creatures of the Night.
I have one last request. As you end us, please don’t think of us as creatures. If you are to end our goals, remember us as children of the night. Remember the people we were, and let us return to those names in peace.
“Children of the Night...I can do that,” Allison said. “I really do understand why you have done what you have done. It doesn’t make it okay, but I do understand. I will give you that honor.”
Thank you, Allison. I am ready.
Allison took a deep breath and closed her eyes. She felt Ichaival form in her hands and the soothing voice of Leptous filled her mind—he wasn’t saying anything specific, but she could tell he was offering a final prayer to the Child of the Night that used to be his father.
She drew the arrow and the light pooled at the arrowhead—the warmth that emitted from it was almost too much. It collected and then she let loose, sending the arrow of light straight through the pupil—the entire cave was filled with a blinding white light.
The light took a minute to fully fade, and when it did she could see that the eye was no more. The energy from the shot was so great that it left not a shred of evidence that Egregore had existed in this realm.
You did the right thing, Allison.
“I know...but I hate that each encounter I have with the Children of the Night I grow to like them more and more. I wish I didn’t have to be on this side against them.”
Do you doubt your goals?
Allison shook her head. “Not for a minute, but that doesn’t make me feel any better about it.
I understand. I appreciate the difficulty this decision places on you—because if it were easy, I would not be sure that you would grow from it...now, if you would kindly exit this cave, I sense someone has arrived for you.
Allison cocked her head, “What do you mean?” She waited for an answer, but it was clear then that Leptous planned to speak no more. She decided then it must be a case where she was going to have to find out for herself.
She started to work her way out of the cave. She kept Ichaival out as the light that emitted off the bow itself was helpful for navigating down the darkened trail. As she got closer to the entrance of the cave she could hear a faint flapping in the wind.
When she breached the mouth of the cave her eyes opened wide as they adjusted to the full light from the moon outside.
Just outside was a cobalt blue dragon with a stone embedded in its chest with a red rock emitting like some sort of crystal heart. In the dragon’s arms was Laven, who looked at her with a surprised, but joyful look.
We have reconnected with the other pact-partner. They have overcome the challenges that had previously plagued them.
“Hello Ally,” The dragon said—its voice was harsh and rugged, but it distinctly had the tone of--
“LUCAS?”
“We didn’t expect to see you here, but we are glad you are. So much has happened since we last got separated—I felt so awful after Enforal.”
“You have a story to tell, I can see it plain on your face and how you hold yourself. You have grown a lot in the short time since we last spoke.” Laven said. “And it seems we do too,” she looked up to Lucas.
Allison looked to them and then nodded. “That we do.” Her mind returned to the conversation she had just had with Egregore. We sure do.
“Oh, and, so we can get it out of the way,” she began. “You can call me Allison.”