Karma scrunched his nose. My Domain is far too aligned with the golden threads to directly spawn a black hole. This would be limited to the metaphysical realm: but to what end?

"Hey, Anlîthëma?"

"Yes?"

"Are you amenable to some harmless experimentation?"

"Okay."

"I know I'm not the most relia—" Karma gawked. "Huh?"

"I said, 'Okay.'" Mercurial motes shed from her skin, joining beside her in a perfect replica. "Now, if the Dao of derivation couldn't clone, that would be cause for surprise."

"Oh! Silly me," said Karma, face-palming. "She thinks it's okay because it's a clone ... Yeah, should be fine."

"What was that?"

"Nothing! Let's get started."

Karma cupped empty air as if swaddling an orb.

Space begets fabric begets thread. I wed you, all that is solid, with the horrors of collapse.

A spiral vortex gyrated an invisible nucleus, its wisps stellar-silver.

Collapse, collapse, the vehicle from big to small and small to smaller. I invoke thee on thyself. Thou must collapse until thou shrinks what cannot be shrunk. Even still, thou must collapse!

The vertex held its size but not its hue. So dense was its body that light faltered in its escape.

But collapse to what, when naught can be collapsed? Look to your bride, for she is space and she is solid. Collapse space unto solid—make your wife whole and hope she returns the honor and relishes the privilege!

Silver waned and dusk waxed, for light could not escape. No, a realm of the single belies no escape. All must be one.

A scream greater than human and less—far less!—than beast plied Karma's ears. His lids snapped open to Anlîthëma's likeness flayed of all her skin. The main body watched aghast yet safe, her aspect agape as can be.

"H-harmless? You—" She looked at Karma in, somehow, even greater terror than previous.

"Hm?" Karma yelped girlishly. "My deep, manly voice! Where has it gone?"

"You ... mirror," heaved Anlîthëma, hand over heart. "Look ... mirror!"

Karma hailed a remnant hidden for precaution at the realm's nadir. A spatial gate split and spit Karma#2 before him. "How'd it go—oooh mother sweet peaches! Why are you a woman?"

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

"How could you tell?" asked Karma#1.

"Well, Anlîthëma, are you a woman?"

She glared at him. "I am."

"Hey! Not judging," said Karma#2, waving vigorously. He turned to Karma#1. "If Anlîthëma's a woman, and you look like Anlîthëma, what does that make you?"

Karma#1 scratched her head. "That would make me ..." an omega blazed overhead, inverting the dusky funnel into a silver sun. "A former woman!" he shouted, over-baritone.

"Close enough! Did we reach middle-stage Earthly Monarch?"

"Kinda."

Karma#2 nodded. "An ascension of the spirit cannot bear the body, for the Buddha is fat, yet his mind is enlightened."

"You know the Cants of the Indestructible Vajra?" blurted Anlîthëma.

"What?"—"Who?"

**

Hadley's head was on a constant swivel. His hands covered two aching imperatives: groin and nape, both red for different reasons.

"What's wrong, Captain?" called his vice-captain—Tomen—striding from the tenement district. "Are you ill?"

"Not ill: Haunted!" Hadley chewed his lip, still surveying in sweeping arcs. "An immortal wraith has planted its curse within me! I kill it, and it returns in vengeance—no sin too great, no place too sacred! I toss it into the hole, and it comes bearing chilling whispers like lovers' coos. Why? Why!?"

"Calm yourself!" boomed Tomen, stomping up to the captain. "You are the esteemed captain of A'Zor'El. You will not abase yourself to me or any other. Such is your mantle—your prestige."

Hadley curled into a ball. "It's too late ... It's here."

"What's here?"

"Stop! Get away, please!" Hadley scampered back. "Faceless! You're all faceless!"

Tomen couldn't hear. How could he, with howls so loud? So manic? All that was Tomen was stripped—flayed!—from his facade. He became faceless, like the others, and then a new Tomen arrived in his wake. "Shh," hushed "Tomen," sporting a pearly grin. "Don't tell anyone. Besides, who would believe you? Would they be fast enough? Faster than me?"

"I won't! I wonnnn't."

"I believe you." The thing receded into a shadowed hall. "Me, and only me."

Only Its porcelain smile remained visible in the darkness.

"Forever."

**

"A most intriguing approach to scrying the Mechanics of fear," analyzed Anlîthëma. "To segment fear into two parts: the witness and the stricken, and feed the sum to one—a beautiful display of efficiency."

"An apt deconstruction," assented Karma. "But you have neglected the preconditioning that pared the subject's mental fortitude to its current frailty. Refer to the shot eyes and the quaking knuckles: all signs of energy-deprivation."

"I assumed the sleep-cultivation inversion principle would negate such a factor?"

"It would. Consider: Is the subject cultivating?"

"I understand. Your clarification was most helpful. Cheers, Boss."

"As was your commentary. You captured my ideas with wondrous precision. Cheers."

They clinked teacups bearing the A'Zor'El logo of a solar eclipse.

Slurp.

****

I want to die. I want to die. I want to die. I want to die. I ...

Every day, another victim. Colleagues, friends, even inmates of rapport were skinned to his budding sorrow. Their memories twined and meshed into a chimeral nightmare that hid behind closed lids. He dreaded them—dreaded sleep.

He dreaded everything.

"Give me fear," he heard within, relieved to hear a voice he did not know. "When I have it, you'll be free."

"Fear ... fear. All I have is fear. What more can I give?"

"Your life."

"But death is scary."

"Scarier than life?"

"I don't know. I wish I knew."

"The answer lies in the hole of mighty black. Take a dive and find your answer. Your release."

"My release." Hadley stumbled to the singularity's edge and yearned. Yearned for release. "I'll do it!"

He jumped.

In the shadow of his plunge, a new Hadley watched the old.

And then old and new were but one and the same.

Forever.