Young Justice: Gotham
October 4rd, 2010
“Stay safe, okay? I’ll be back before you know it.” I placed a chaste kiss on Zatanna’s lips and pulled away. I didn’t like that Zatanna was heading back to that school of hers just days after Metropolis had been attacked, but not enough to fight her on the issue.
My eyes found Raven’s, who was standing behind Zatanna. The woman nodded sharply and touched her hand against the handle of her sword. I’d impressed upon her just how important Zatanna’s well being was to me, and she’d agreed completely. While I was gone, Raven was Zatanna’s best defense, and she took her responsibility as a bodyguard very seriously.
Zatanna laughed, her voice slightly strained. “I should be the one telling you that. I’m just going to school, while you don’t even know where you’re going yet.”
I smiled tightly. “Perhaps. But it's good advice either way.”
She had no response to that.
A few minutes later, I reappeared in my room, having apparated to Metropolis so that Raven could open a portal for Zatanna to use to get to school. We’d embraced one more time, and then I’d watched her hurry off to class. Our…farewell activities had run slightly long this morning, leaving her already running late for class.
My mind was elsewhere as I mechanically moved around the house, taking care of the last few things I needed to do before I could depart. I dispelled Glynda, leaving Blake and Raven alone in the house, collected a few bits and bobs I’d unpacked over the past three-or-so weeks, and changed into the latest version of my travel clothing.
The robe, pants, shirt, and leather boot were all heavily enchanted, but unlike the clothing I’d worn to the disastrous dinner with Giovanni, these enhancements were made to last. They were a tad less protective, but in exchange, the spellwork would last for months before degrading, not hours. They were also enchanted with all sorts of comfort, environmental, and detection spells, ensuring that I’d be okay even if I ended up in a scorching desert, freezing blizzard, or surrounded by noxious fumes.
Then it was time to go. It was much easier this time. I’d gotten considerably better at interacting with my Spark and no longer required half an hour of meditation to step out of the world, even without a land bond to smooth the journey.
I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, focused, and took a single step forward. Instead of polished hardwood, my foot found smooth nothingness. I opened my eyes and looked around, peering curiously at the dark shadows moving through the nothingness. I was reminded of the name that Jinn had given me for this place. The Blind Eternities.
It was an apt name. Though nothing truly barred my vision, I still found this endless place hard to parse, my mind not quite able to grasp what my senses were telling me. I could see other planes as shadows, faint impressions of existence on the endless unreality through which they floated.
Unlike the last time I’d chosen to travel to a new Plane, this time I moved with far more purpose. My Spark shone around me, protecting me from the ravages of the chaotic energy that filled this place. As I walked, I peered curiously at the shadows of other Planes, searching for something…familiar. Either Rabiah, that odd myriad Plane that Jinn had shown me, or some sign of my own home plane.
With a child on the way, returning home had suddenly become a moderately pressing issue. It could wait, but not forever. My children would need to learn the history of my family, and someday they would need wands and schoolbooks that I could not find in my new home. There was only so much I could teach them, and I knew nothing of wandlore.
I found nothing. I passed by shadow after shadow, the protection of my Spark slowly burning away. Eventually, I paused, considering the nearest shadow. I’d traveled quite a ways, the bonds between me and the two other Planes I’d visited previously stretching out behind me. The Blind Eternities stretched out around me in all directions, just as vast and chaotic as they always had been. I did not know if this place was truly infinite, but it certainly felt that way. Like I could walk and walk and walk and never reach an end.
It was probably a bad idea to keep going. Already, I could feel my Spark’s protections waning. They would still last for some time, but walking too far now would simply increase how long I’d need to wait before I left this place. If I needed to leave immediately, I doubted I’d be able to safely travel all the way back home. I’d lost track of something very much like time as I marveled at the multiverse around me. Perhaps I should have stopped earlier. Somewhere…closer to where I’d begun.
Well, nothing to be done about it now. But it was something to remember for the future. I wondered if the ‘distance’ I’d ‘walked’ would have any impact on what sort of Planes surrounded me. It was impossible to say from the outside, but perhaps such an answer could guide me towards home.
And so I shrugged mentally and stepped towards this new Plane. It was beautiful from the outside, an impossibly complex mural of color and shadow. I hoped I could find new magic here. New lands to bond with. New Blueprints and treasures to collect.
I paused, a single step between me and reality. The nothingness here felt…just slightly different. It was faint. So much so that I was not certain if it was real or just something I was imagining. Like the ripples of a rock thrown into an already turbulent river, just moments from behind absorbed into the chaotic maelstrom around it.
I had no idea what it meant, or if it meant anything at all. I examined the feeling, committing the phantom sensation to memory. Something to consider later. And then I stepped through the boundary that divided nothing from everything and my feet found solid ground.
I stumbled slightly and instinctively flailed my arms to steady myself. Instead of my feet landing flat on the ground, my boots had touched down at an angle, leaving me just slightly off balance. I focused and a gust of wind steadied me, my feet briefly rising a fraction of an inch off the ground before I landed with a soft thump.
“You alright over there?” a rough, deep voice called.
I jerked around, nearly tripping over my feet. I blinked rapidly as I saw the short, armored man walking towards me, the head of a large ax extending up over his shoulder and his face half-hidden by a thick, well-kept beard. If not for his beard and adult proportions, I would have thought he was a child. His head barely reached up to the center of my chest.
Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.
I hadn’t expected there to be anyone where I arrived––both Slaughter Swamp and that ruined tomb had been completely empty––but as I looked past the short man, I saw a number of other individuals nearby. Several wore matching plate armor and heraldry––a golden lion on a blue background––while others were dressed in a mishmash of armor, robes, and regular clothing.
No one seemed to be looking at me strangely except the short man, who was rapidly moving towards me, his armor clanking with every step. I shook myself and turned to face him. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m good.” I rubbed the back of my head in feigned embarrassment, “Seems like I tripped over my own two feet.”
He stopped and clicked his tongue. “If you mages spent a little less time buried in your books and a little more on the training field, there’d be a lot less accidents,” he grumbled. “I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve had to stop Shayla from walking into a wall or statue. It's not healthy to be reading at all hours of the day like that.”
He clearly wasn’t paying me much attention anymore now that I’d assured him that I was okay, but my eyes lit up at his words. Mages and books, both mentioned offhand to a stranger. That was very promising. Combined with the handful of robed men and women passing by, it seemed like magic was even more well known around here than it was in Zatanna’s world. Hopefully that meant it wouldn’t be too hard to get my hands on that sort of knowledge.
The man turned and began walking away, grumbling faintly into his beard as he went. I watched him go for a moment, my eyes lingering on the dangerous looking ax on his back. That was not a tool, but a weapon. And I could see the enchantments, foreign as they were, woven through the shiny metal and long wooden handle. The fact that he was wearing something like that openly, and that many of the other people I could see were also carrying weapons, said a lot about this new place I found myself.
I shook my head and straightened, looking around at my new surroundings with interest. I was standing on a wide bridge of well-polished stone. There were two raised footpaths on either side of the bridge, and the central area was wide enough to allow a carriage or wagon to pass comfortably.
To the left and right of the bridge stretched a grassy valley, bisected by a narrow moat over which the bridge had been built. There was an open gate some distance behind me, and a high stone wall like that of a castle in front of me. The bridge was also lined with five statues, two on either side and a fifth in front of the wall. They were enormous, each one towering high overhead and casting long shadows across the bridge. I estimated that the one next to me was at least thirty feet tall, and that was a very conservative guess.
I took a few steps away from the statue and peered down the length of the bridge. Curiously, it seemed as though the statue beside me depicted a short man much like the one I’d just spoken with, his proportions clearly quite stocky even on the oversized edifice. He was holding a hammer up into the sky, golden accents gleaming in the sunlight.
The other four statues depicted an armored man with a massive sword hanging on his back, a robed and bearded man with a long staff that was likely meant to be a wizard, a woman with a quiver of arrows on her hip, a large bird perched on her arm, and a bow held at her side, and finally another armored man holding a broken sword by the blade and a large tome at his side.
I was pulled away from studying the statues when I noticed a rather baffling creature walking past me. It was tall and slender, and dressed in some manner of oddly-proportioned, ineffective-looking green armor. It had a bow and quiver on its back, a shortsword hanging at its belt, and the proportions of a woman, but that was where the similarities ended. Its skin was a bright shade of pink and its hair blue like a sapphire. It was tall, taller than any woman I’d ever seen, and its eyes were bright silver and lacked a pupil. It had pointed ears almost like a goblin, but oversized to a great degree, extending up through its hair and several inches into the air.
I silently watched it go by. Other people did not seem to be giving it more than a second glance, accepting it among them as though its presence was an everyday occurrence. Perhaps it was. I didn’t see any other such creatures around, but there were only so many people on this bridge.
I looked back at the statue of the woman and tilted my head to the side, imagining this pink-skinned creature in its place. It fit. What I’d thought were odd hair-ornaments on the statue were clearly ears, though angled slightly differently. Fascinating. A magical creature honored as an equal. Very different from the fountain of magical brethren in the ministry’s atrium back home.
Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed one of the men in matching armor giving me a considering look. He looked like a guard, and I was probably acting suspicious, even if he hadn’t noticed that I had appeared out of thin air. Not wanting any trouble, I put on a smile and began to walk down the bridge towards the distant wall. I was not sure what sort of settlement lay beyond it, but given the amount of traffic moving in both directions, the quality of the stonework, and the number of guards, it was probably at least a reasonably populous one.
I joined the flow of people, blending in reasonably well with the occasional robed man or woman. My black robes didn’t quite match up with the more common whites, yellows, blues, and purples, but I was certainly not unique with my black clothing. We moved slowly down the bridge, and then around the fifth statue towards a large, open gate. There were a number of guards flanking the entrance, slowing traffic as they spoke to people trying to move past them.
As I waited, I continued to look around and soon noticed what I was pretty sure was another magical creature. It was even shorter than the stout man from before, and less built. Still, it looked and acted like an adult, with a pair of bulky goggles over its eyes and a wrench nearly as tall as it was cradled in its arms. Very interesting.
Eventually, I reached the gate and a bored-sounding woman in plate armor, her helmet tucked under her arm to reveal a long mane of black hair, some of it stuck to her forehead with sweat, turned to address me. She looked me up and down, her dark eyes flicking between my boots, robe, and the bangles on my arms. Then she smiled tightly, “Well met, adventurer,” she rattled off, using the same words I’d heard a few dozen times from other guards in the past few minutes, “The Alliance bids you welcome to the great city of Stormwind. What brings you to our gates today?”
I smiled back at her pleasantly. “Just visiting temporarily,” I answered, much like I’d heard dozens of other people answer in the past few minutes, “I’m looking to relax a little before heading back out.”
“Of course. There are plenty of taverns to visit in Old Town, and goods from all corners of Azeroth can be found in the Trade District. Light be with you!”
And then she stepped out of the way and waved me through the gate. I hurried past her, allowing her to address the group of men who’d been standing behind me. I moved some distance down the wide, cobbled road until the flood of people moving past me had subsided somewhat, then stepped to the side and looked out over the land beyond the wall.
This was no small settlement, castle, or town. This was a city. A small city compared to the muggle settlements of Zatanna’s plane, but quite massive by the standards of the technology I could see around me. I’d guessed as much upon seeing the armor and weapons, but looking out on the city, it was clear that this plane was still in a period of history before the signing of the Statute of Secrecy.
Before me lay what I assumed to be the trade district. I could see all sorts of shops and stalls, and the light of magic twinkled off of weapons, armor, potions, and all sorts of other goods. In the distance, I could see a tall spire of white stone reaching up high into the sky, and off to one side were the towers of a great castle.
I couldn’t wait to look around.