The grand house stood before Roxanne and Cassandra like a monolith. There were short walls before it, with some metal rusted metal attached to the bricks indicating that a fence once stood. The house was huge, easily at least twice the size of every other building here.
"Well, are you ready?" Aspasia asked.
"Sure?" Roxanne asked. She felt something build up in her throat. Something was going off in her brain, pinging different sectors of it that were something off. But since she couldn't place it, she silently declared to her brain it was nothing of importance.
"Look, I have to deal with the shield. I take it you two can behave without me?"
"I got this, mom." Cassandra said with a thumbs up. Just acknowledging her as her mom still felt strange. Amazing, but strange.
Roxanne confidentially walked up to the door, leaving three loud knocks. She stood back and waited. Time slowed to a crawl, but sped to slightly less of a crawl when footsteps were heard from inside. And when the door finally creaked open slightly, time rushed to it fully opening, and Roxanne was face to face with the owner.
The older woman wore a pink sweater and casual black sweatpants. Her hair was short and frizzy. Small circular glasses were above her nose. And to top the outfit off, a necklace with a purple gem in it's centre.
She stood still for a second, mouth slightly open in a confused position. But when she shifted her gaze slightly to Cassandra, everything fell into place in her mind.
"This…it's you. You're back."
The pieces fell in Roxanne's mind too. This was her mother. Her parents were alive, in front of her.
"Mom!"
Roxanne leapt into the womans arms, and she caught her by instinct. They embraced without saying a word, while a man stepped down the stairs to see what was going on. Roxanne looked up, and the scrawny man in a suit teared up, his thick glasses fogging up from the sight of her.
"Honey, get the lounge ready!" The woman yelled.
After a few minutes of shuffling upstairs, Roxanne and Cassandra were invited to the upstairs lounge. Inside it was a small television set with some kind of movie playing. The quality was awful, so even on the small chance Roxanne had seen it, she wouldn't recognize it. Some cupcakes were left on the table, while Roxanne and Cassandra were sat around a blue velvet sofa, and her parents were each on a velvet armchair.
"So, are introductions in order?" The mother asked. "Yes, I think we should start there. My name is Davina Morrow, and my husband is Claude. And we try our best to keep this city up and running. And your name is?"
"Um, it's Roxanne." Roxanne said quietly.
"Oh, they chose such a good name!" Claude yelled. He also had a purple gemstone necklace.
"Look, if I'm connected to you through the necklace, and I ended up on the ship, what exactly happened to get me there?"
Davina meekly put her head down, but let it shoot back up.
"You see, our family has always been the rulers. That's what the purple gemstones means. But when Chelic escaped to the world above, we knew he had the potential to destroy not only the world above, but use the power there to ruin everything around here, too. If we're not careful, the world itself could be at risk."
"So the gemstone means I'm important."
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"We're royalty, basically. And that means we have to do something."
"And why couldn't you do something?" Roxanne asked.
"Because people would get suspicious. And we're also needed to take charge of everything that happens. So that left the two babies of our brightest to go up after Chelic, grow up, and lead the skies against him."
"You thought to let two babies do that?" Cassandra asked flatly.
"Also, how did you even get us up there?" Roxanne asked.
"Just a few miles away from the city is mount Weyes." Claude asked. "It's a trek, but once every few months, a grand is a little accessible with the right power set. So we let a man called Tunde, with the ability to fly, carry you to a small housing ship and hope for the best."
"That was your solution?" Cassandra asked.
"I'll admit it wasn't the most ideal, or even had that high of a success rate. But it worked, did it not?"
Cassandra and Roxanne looked at each other. It sort of worked? They knew all the rulers, and Cassandra was hopefully able to impact the world with Zach's help. They were all one step closer to finishing off the Legion.
"And speaking of Tunde, he has a son about Roxanne's age, right?" Claude asked.
"Oh, yes!" Davina replied with excited hand claps. "There are pictures of him in our photobooks, right? Could you try to get them?"
Claude dashed off while Roxanne was left with Davina, anticipating what came next.
"So…what's the son like?"
"Oh, he's such a lovely boy. Very considerate and caring, and he works as a farmer to produce food!"
"Sounds like a great guy." Roxanne nodded nervously.
"Yeah, he was born with enhanced strength! So he can protect as many people here as he needs to!"
"…Amazing."
Claude came back with the teased photos, handing them to Roxanne with a smile plastered on his face. She flipped through the photos of the young man. He was certainly handsome. Good muscle definition, nicely styled hair. His smiles with the community seemed genuine. He was certainly a good guy, that much was obvious.
"He's nice." She nodded as she handed back the photos.
"How nice?" Claude replied, leaning in with a cheeky grin.
"Just…nice." Roxanne said, lowering the intensity of the nod a few notches.
"Well, she's probably got a boyfriend up on the skies at this point, let's not pressure her!" Davina said as she put her hands on Roxanne's shoulders.
"Hm? Well, not yet. But I have been on a ton of dates recently!"
"Oh, excellent!" Davina yelled. "So, how were the boys?"
"Yeah, they were all fine, but things happened between us, you know how it is."
"Well, our marriage was arranged, so…not particularly. But I'm sure it's hard."
"Yeah, I imagine that simplifies things." Roxanne said, feeling now was good time to get back to nodding.
"Wow, excessive nodding." Cassandra noticed. "I think that's a sign we should go to bed. Mind if we stay here the night?"
"There should be a spare room upstairs." Claude said. "If you need help cleaning…"
"We've slept in worse!" Cassandra yelled, pushing Roxanne upstairs.
They found the spare room, a near empty room aside from two beds. Cassandra sat down on one after closing the door, while Roxanne flopped back first onto the other.
"So, how's that one guy?" Cassandra asked.
Roxanne just let out a long and exhausted groan.
"I guessed." Cassandra sighed. "So I'm guessing your parents want you married off?"
"Probably." Roxanne sighed. Her voice was low. She was just tired. Not tired from the eventful day, but somehow more tired from the idea of dealing with any more romantic antics.
"Cass, can I be honest with you?"
"Shoot."
"I think I hate the idea of being in a relationship."
"For real?"
"I mean, it's not like it ever lasted more than a day, no matter who I latched onto. And now I'm asking myself why I tried so hard to force myself into it, and I guess it's because I had to. Everyone said I had to, that it was expected. Or else I was nothing. But honestly, I think I'm fine with that."
"So what's next?" Cassandra asked.
"What you mean?"
"Well, if your reason for tagging along with us was finding the love of your life, and you don't feel made for it, what's your next goal."
"Stopping the Legion, I guess? After that…eh, I'm too tired to plan anything, I'll tell you in the morning."
Dream world.
Been a while since she's been here. Granted, it's been a while since Roxanne thought about love, which looking back is one hundred percent what triggers this. The figure flew by her, but it didn't seem aggressive this time. It just floated in front of her, relaxed.
"You're nothing." The voice reverberated through her head. She had a mild headache, but that was fine.
"Guess I am." Roxanne shrugged.
And that was that. The light around the figure slowly flew off into pieces that faded into the distance of the endless void. And at the end was…another Roxanne.
"You're nothing." The other Roxanne repeated casually. She flew into her, a slight tingling sensation coming over her before her next sight was the ceiling of her parents house.
As opposed to every other time she had the dream, she felt fine. Cassandra was still fast asleep, clutching her pillow. The sun was peering out from the windows, and Roxanne felt ready to accomplish her goals.
Whatever they were.