Rolling plains met a wide river with light that shone in gentle sunbeams. Large rocks dotted alongside the river so that Danna's otters would have somewhere to sun themselves. Now though, they fought with the river at their back.

Humans had come in with a wide variety of powers though the most common was fire. Flashes of light shot across the plains towards them and she could feel the anger from her followers like a physical thing in this heaven. They snarled as those without powers of light shot forward to do battle and stop them from profaning this holy place.

If they were killed here, they would simply move forward to reincarnate, but her followers had earned their rest and she wouldn't let this usurper break it.

"Enough!" Danna clapped her hands together and held them like she was in prayer. The sound resonated through the entire realm, vibrating the ground in an almost cartoonish motion that caused all parties to stumble and steady themselves.

With her next breath, she reached into the river of Truth and brought her Divinity to bear. Hundreds of arms made of golden light appeared, each of them turning to mist before the elbow. These hands pinned the humans back, stopping them from attacking her followers.

"Why have you come here?," she said it quietly, but her voice was laced with Intent that carried it past the flickering black portal from whence the humans had come.

A laugh bubbled through as though her demands were nothing more than that of a petulant child. Black smoke rolled through the portal like a shadow given form and it drifted across the landscape. Each time it touched one of her constructed arms, it pressed against them, holding her power in check with Divinity of its own.

Then the voice came. A very familiar voice. "Hello Danna."

Richard's father stepped through the portal. His hair was darker than it had been as an older man and no wrinkles crossed his brow or cheeks. He stood with the easy confidence of a tyrant and calmly fixed the cuff on his suit as he studied her.

"How are you here?"

"Did you think you were special? Did you think it was love that brought you into being? Foolish." The Father shook his head as he stepped further into her realm. The humans that she had pinned looked to him with wide eyes. In them, Danna saw a mixture of awe and fear. The Father gestured towards her.

"No, it was only the wide eyes of the ignorant who looked up and saw someone greater than themselves and mistook them for a god. He may worship your coddling, but he fears me. He has no choice, but to recognize my power."

Both the otters and humans all watched as the two gods spoke across Danna's heaven, trying to understand their words. Danna herself was reeling in a way that she hadn't since she'd become a god. She knew what had to be true, but it just seemed ludicrous. "You're saying he brought us both into existence?"

"I knew that even you could figure it out eventually."

Danna had forgotten how casually dickish he could be. "So you decided to attack my followers for what? A reunion?"

"My son is at a pivotal moment in his new life right now. Frankly, I'm just here to use up your Divinity so you can't distract him. You whored your way between us before and I won't allow that to continue. He may be pathetic garbage, but he's mine. No one steals from me."

Danna started to dip into the river of Truth to check on Gi's status, but as soon as she did, the shadowy fog that enveloped her manifested hands pulled and yanked her back into the present moment.

"None of that now."

The Father walked through the battlefield and with a gesture, Danna's manifested arms flexed backwards, releasing the humans. With a shout, the humans resumed their fight with her otters. Danna watched as a fountain of fire collided with one of her newly dead Hunters.

In anger, Danna pulled on the mighty river of Truth, drinking deeply as a giant hand materialized above the Father. With a thought, it swung down to crush him.

"Stop." That single word lay heavy with both Intent and Divinity. Danna's manifested hand froze in midair, bringing with it a sensation like a hand wrapped around her throat. The Father took another step and appeared directly in front of her. A cruel, amused smile played on his lips.

"You have omniscience and omnipotence at your very fingertips and it never occurred to you to learn how to protect it. You've spent all your meager Divinity keeping Richard and his followers alive, leaving me to plant seeds and grow my power. You are the same foolish girl that you were on Earth."

"Fuck y-"

"Cease."

******

Gi rushed towards Yultir, barreling through the a tall brush, but he found himself once again at the entrance witnessing the same view as when he just arrived. The long hanging vines and carefully manicured bushes played contrast to Yultir's crooked grin. Gi turned and ran back into the facility... only to arrive in the gardens again with Yultir still grinning at him.

[Divine Ire] sparked from Gi's palm and he fired it randomly in three directions. None of the bushes or vines were damaged as each image was disrupted before returning to its usual state.

"Do you feel that sense of helplessness? I'm sure the Brain Goblins felt similarly as you struck them down."

Gi didn't respond and instead continued to fire out blasts in random directions. Nothing he did managed to change anything. His Heart was supposed to protect him from this. What was going on?

"Let me out," Gi snarled.

"Aha, no. Nice try though. Maybe you should try begging?"

Gi returned all of his summons to himself and launched a dazzling pinwheel of light in all directions, but everything just turned to mist briefly before resettling. He wasn't doing any lasting damage.

"Perhaps, you thought us weak because you have a Unique Heart. Truthfully, that is enough against many in my clan, but against my ascended Soul? You're trapped."

Gi's mind raced as he tried to think of a way out of here. If it was this easy to capture him then why had the Illusor Clan not taken Ferra out? She hadn't even had a Unique Heart or at least, he didn't think she had. What was the solution?

"That helplessness that you feel now is a perfect setting for the next stage."

At Yultir's words, the garden faded completely. In its place, Gi lay in a dark room. A ceiling fan drifted lazily overhead and a piercing wail could be heard from another room in the house. With no control over his own body, Gi turned and shook the person sleeping next to him.

To Gi's astonishment, his hand wasn't the furry paw that he currently had. It was a human hand with five hairless long digits. What was Yultir showing him?

"Hmn?" The bundle of blankets woke up groggily, bloodshot eyes found Gi's own and he realized that despite the disheveled hair and angry glare, he was looking at Danna.

"Noah's crying," Gi said. He could feel the words forming on his lips. He felt the frustration at being woken up, knowing that he needed to be fresh for work tomorrow and whatever fresh new hell that his manager threw at his team. Yet, he still felt separate. This was the most vivid vision that he'd ever had.

"You handle it," Danna said, her voice heavy from just waking up.

"I've got work tomorrow. That was our deal."

Danna's face screwed up as both hatred and disgust seemed to war across her features and that single look on her face hurt Gi far more than anything had since he'd been birthed as a slime.

"Why can't you just help me for once?," she spat. "You just take and you take and you take. I'm being drained dry emotionally. I spend all day, every day, with a baby that cries. I spend all night taking care of Noah and do you ever think to help me? No. You're too concerned with yourself. Stop being a useless partner."

If her expression had hurt him before, her words mirroring his own father's hurt worse. Richard snapped.

"I go to work all day, getting berated by my boss no matter how good of a job I do and this is the thanks I get? It was your idea for us to drop to one salary. It was your idea for you to take Noah at night so I'd be well rested for work."

Danna had thrown off the covers, her long night shirt hanging off of her frame, and yelled. "IT'S ALWAYS MY IDEA. Every idea in this relationship is my idea because you never step up and contribute. If I was the only one in this relationship, there would be no fucking difference because I already decide everything."

Tears had already started to run down Richard's face and his father's remarks about how only women and children cry only made him angrier. "You don't get to say I don't contribute. The food that our family eats is made off of my hard work."

"If you can even remember to pick it up!"

Richard slammed his hand onto the bed and Noah continued to cry in his nursery. "Is that what this is about? I FORGOT. Everyone makes mistakes."

"All I ever seem to get is your mistakes."

Richard clenched his hands into fists and they quivered as he yelled. "WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME?"

Danna yelled right back as she wringed the blanket in her hands. "HELP ME. Do literally anything to help instead of being a fucking useless picture on the wall."

"You want me to go take care of Noah? Fine. I'll go take care of Noah right now."

Richard started to step around the bed, but Danna stopped him. "No, I don't want your help after I scream at you. Just stay in here and leave me alone."

She walked out of the room and a couple moments later, he could hear her, talking calmly to Noah. Richard felt poleaxed. Danna wanted help, but when he offered, she turned him down. He paced around the room furious that she didn't value the effort he put in at work. He made up arguments in his head about how valuable his work was, but he didn't get to make them.

Danna didn't come back to bed that night and Richard drove to work the next day, exhausted after being unable to sleep the rest of the night. The cars seemed to move too fast as he drove and his anger had all leaked out of him overnight.

The only thing he could focus on was the look of disgust that had been on her face and her calling him useless. His father had always felt that way about him and he'd believed it with his entire being before he'd met Danna. In the past, she'd celebrated him for the person that he was.

Had she finally seen in him what his father saw? Had she been wrong about him?

From their many years of a relationship, Richard had learned to dispute that voice so he focused on the one area that he knew helped. He brought home the money that they needed. He provided for his family.

Those thoughts continued until he arrived in the parking lot. He opened the center console to grab his keycard, pushing aside a bottle of tylenol to grab it. With his laptop bag flung over his shoulder, he took several deep breaths and practiced smiling before he felt confident enough to go inside and fake it for a day.

Charlie and Bastien were already there, talking over coffee in the break room and he gave them a big smile and wave before heading into his office. He took his computer out and placed it into the laptop dock.

The login screen popped up and he tapped his password in like he did every day.

Incorrect password.

His hands were still a little shaky from the argument so he just retyped it in, taking his time to make sure he hit all the right keys.

Incorrect password.

"What the hell...?" Richard muttered. After typing it in one more time, the same notification appeared. He picked up his phone to call service desk when his boss popped his head in.

"Richard. You're here. Good. Come by my office."

"Of course," Richard said with a big fake smile. "Give me just a second to call service desk. I'm locked out of my machine."

"You won't need it. Just come on."

Richard got up, leaving his bag and computer behind and followed his boss. The older man wore a crisp suit like usual and walked with an excellent, if stiff, posture. Richard's eyes cast around at the few other people in the office that had gotten here as early as he had and they were all giving him a strange look.

Odd. Maybe he was just tired and reading into it after the fight last night. He was well liked by everyone except his boss. At least, he thought they liked him. He thought Danna had too.

They turned into the boss's office, but it wasn't empty. A woman wearing a white blouse with a ruffled collar over blue slacks sat with a stack of papers in front of her on his boss's desk. He knew her. Denise from HR, but why was she here...?

The door clicked as his boss shut it and turned to sit down in front of him. His slicked back black hair seemed particularly villainous as Richard's exhausted mind finally figured out what was going on.

"You can't do this..."

His boss sighed and Denise tried to maintain a perfectly neutral expression. "This shouldn't be a surprise, Richard. Your team is constantly behind on the tasks assigned. They did well before you were promoted. What's the common denominator?"

Richard wanted to explain that his boss was also a new element. He wanted to explain that the constantly shifting priorities and enormous workload would be impossible for anyone to complete. However as his eyes started to water, he couldn't do any of that.

"I have a family. A little boy! They need me..." Richard swiped angrily at the tears on his face. "I- please..."

"It's already done. We've got people gathering your things. We just need you to sign this paperwork and it's done."

Denise pushed the small stack of papers across to him and handed him a pen. Richard took the pen in shaking hands, but looked up pleadingly at Denise. Surely, she could...

"Take as long as you need," she said, stabbing the finality of his situation in with a saccharine sweetness. His manager just looked at his watch.

"Just sign it. We've got work to do and we don't need you continuing to hold us up."

Robotically, Richard signed the document. Denise said more things to him, but it was little more than a buzz to him. He stepped out of the office and the people in the office stared at him. They knew that he was being fired because he was unable to do his job. The one thing he had.

When he passed the section with his team, their expressions were full of pity. The kind of expression that you gave to a helpless child. Richard continued to cry as he made his way down to the lowest floor and a member of security handed him his personal effects in a box.

Like a zombie, he trudged back to his car, tossing the box into the passenger seat and sat there. He wiped his eyes and sniffed loudly, but his hands continued shaking.

What was he going to do? He couldn't go back home. Danna had been right. How could he face her now as someone as useless as she said? He clenched his shirt at his chest and leaned forward until his head rested on the steering wheel.

It just hurt so much...

With a sudden inspiration, he opened his console and pulled out his bottle of tylenol. He shook a handful in his hand and dry swallowed the pills. Not confident that would be enough, he shook out another handful and tossed that back as well.

His life had fallen apart so quickly. What could he do? Should he go see his father? He'd always known Richard was useless so it wasn't like he would be disappointed. His father always knew what to do.

Richard started the car and set to drive the hour that it took to get to his father's house. Since he'd retired, he did most of his work from the house. As he hopped on the highway, a revulsion of going begging to his father for help settled into him.

He'd spent so much time learning to stand on his own two feet with Danna. There was no way she'd have any respect for him if he did that. The look of disgust on her seemed to grow in his mind. He shook his head and it felt like the world spun with it.

His mind started to feel fuzzy and nausea settled into his stomach. His thoughts raced around in a circle between going to the Father and going to Danna. Each cycle had him searching for some other way out, but those were his only two options and neither could fix this. The problem was him.

There was no place in this world for someone as useless as him.

Like God had reached down from heaven, he saw the answer a good half mile ahead of him. Finally, a way out. He slammed his foot into the pedal and blinked his eyes as the world rushed by in his altered state.

A telephone pole stood tall and proud and it grew larger and larger as he got closer to it. It wasn't the best, but it would be a fitting tombstone for such a pathetic life. With the slightest shift of his wrist, Richard turned the car, heard the whine of his tires on the shoulder, and then after a cacophony of pain - nothing.