FH 49

“Dragonfly Strike!” I shouted as I teleported. The jolt of teleportation took some getting used to, as everything about your previous position no longer held true. I could, to an extent, control where I appeared. The parameters of the skill required that I appear within striking distance of my target, but it gave me some choice in exactly where I landed. It didn’t matter how many times I tried the move though; it always ended the same. With my hand caught in the sparkling, platinum mesh covered hand of Momma. She never squeezed, she stopped my blows with a gentleness that I’d never seen in sparring, but she often cooled her hands down to shock me.

“I can’t hit you,” I sulked, as her Third Eye stared deep into my soul.

“No, you can’t,” Momma agreed with a laugh and moved her hand so fast I couldn’t see it. Her hand reappeared at her side, and my hair tussled in the wind. I knew how infuriating it was when I did it to other people since she had done it to me for years now, after seeing me do it to Lilith. Lilith would call it karma. I called inspiration, one day I would be that fast and annoy other people.

“Having an Ability alone doesn’t mean you’ll win every fight, sweetie. Everyone else has Abilities too, and they’re working to strengthen their skills the same as you. You got lucky to acquire such a powerful Ability from a Dungeon, especially for a first Ability. Decent range, teleportation, no cool down, low cost.” Telos looked to the clouds, so I followed her gaze.

The clouds roared quickly through the sky today. They always seemed to be faster over the Plateau of the First Home, but it was a lot higher than the city of Winona down on the plain, near the river. We stayed at Uncle Arkaziel’s house in town most of the time, but Momma came back a lot to use the forge she’d built here. She always muttered about the one she’d built in town sucked for fine work, but since she mostly used her inner world for forging I don’t know why it mattered. I think I caught a glimpse of Uncle Arkaziel flying up in the highest clouds, an immense dragon that blotted out the sun, but then he was gone again.

Nope, the black figure of a world devouring dragon reappeared in a flash, and then bolts of black lightning descended to explode dirt, and split one of Momma’s Adamant Oaks into kindling. When my eyes cleared, a man in a blue shirt covered in pineapples stood there. He was old, with close cut hair on the sides, and barely longer on the top. All his hair was white. The whites of his eyes were painfully bloodshot, and his veins looked like they were full of black blood that shone through his pale skin. He wore khaki shorts, and sandals, and he exuded more power than anyone I’d ever seen before. He glared balefully at Momma, who had interposed herself between the man and I.

Nothing scared Momma, but her outfit went from something suitable for exercise to what she described as her ass-kicking gear. A long black trench coat fluttered in the wind, and mostly hid me. The simple platinum mesh of her gloves now glittered with inset black and aqua gems, and she radiated power every bit as strong as the scary old guy.

“Who the heck are you?” Telos demanded.

“I’m called… Bob,” the man croaked painfully. He spit some blood to the side, as if talking caused his mouth to fill with dark fluids, or maybe just existing caused him pain, he looked ill. How could someone that powerful be sick? It didn’t make sense.

“What do you want? Stay back,” the last words came as Telos held up her hand not to Bob, who hadn’t moved, but to Kallos, who’d come out of the Spire to see what all the commotion was about. Mommy glared at the intruder, but she didn’t take another step closer.

“You’re defenseless.” Dark black lines of something that didn’t exist formed around the man as he spoke. He didn’t seem at all afraid of Telos. “So I’m going to kill you now.”

The dark, strange glyphs and energies turned into a flock of birds that shot straight at Telos. Blasts of light fired from Momma’s Third Eye, but they didn’t block the energies at all. At the very last moment, the power around Telos went so high I thought my head was inflating like a balloon from proximity. Radiant light glittered around the plateau, and in the shadows danced eldritch whispers, and all of creation seemed like it might just be an illusion cast by Momma.

The strange magical bird attack vanished in the blasts of radiance. Momma still stood in front of me, but whatever had happened turned her hair into all the colors, and her clothes too. She seemed stronger. Omnipotent. Even the old man seemed like a ghostly shadow compared to her now. The old man laughed.

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“Not defenseless. Why delay? Your birth changes everything.” Bob didn’t seem like he would attack again, but he also didn’t seem like a good guy.

“I wanted to enjoy a few things first,” Telos answered through grit teeth. Snowflakes danced around her, five of them. Most people might not notice five snowflakes, given everything else going on, but when Momma used ice magic or cold, it was always amazing, so I paid extra attention. “You’re interrupting my private time.”

“A right of passage. I did it, Arcanthar did it, and now you do it. But you had not awoken yet, your essence lies undefended. Arcanthar nearly killed me when he came to me, as I come to you. There can be only one Multiverse. Once a second awakens, the timer starts. We are poison to each other. You and this reality, all these realities, must die.”

The sky blackened, the whole of Mythara shook, and I started to fall into a crack in the earth. Then it was all back to normal, with rainbows in the sky, and Momma glared at this old guy.

“You fully awoke, I see. Then it will be the hard way.” Bob laughed, then shivered. He hadn’t noticed the five snowflakes land on him. One on each shoulder, one in front of his chest and one on his back, and one on his head. A hand covered my eyes, but I heard him die. When Momma took her hands away, there was no sign of Bob or that anything had gone wrong, but then Mommy ran up and hugged me close.

From the way Telos and Kallos looked at each other, they were talking in their minds, but I felt warmth and love in both of their arms, even if Momma’s new clothes were really hard to look at because they were so bright.

Ω

That night a full moon shone upon the Spire. The children were in bed, and Kallos and Telos sat on the balcony at the top of the Spire.

“How long do we have left?” Kallos broke the silence.

“Less than ten years. I had to fully activate all three sets of fifty links to stop his attack. A few less might have been enough, but I never imagined there’d be someone stronger than me in ‘my’ reality. Some of that could have been bravado, maybe, but Alexander was behind me and I couldn’t risk it.” Telos let out a pent up sigh of frustration. “I’m sorry.”

Kallos’ much warmer hand squeezed Telos’ colder hand, and Kallos moved closer to her, sharing her warmth and love both through their bond and physical contact. Telos cuddled against her, accepting and thankful for the comfort.

“You don’t need to be sorry. We already knew we have limited time, my dear.” Kallos didn’t beat around the bush and went to the heart of the matter.

“Nebulously, yeah. I thought I had things under control, and we’d get at least another fifty years before I assimilated. But now, not so much. Can you feel it?” Telos looked Kallos in the eyes, trying to discern if the other woman could feel what awakening had revealed to her.

“Glimpses are all I see. Show me,” Kallos insisted, drawing Telos into a soft kiss, before opening her mind and soul to her rainbow haired partner.

The world became Light. Ein Sof spread infinitely. Yet if one zoomed out far enough, Ein Sof flowed in spiral bands from a center point, infinitely outward. The colors and depths varied inconsistently, and in a few places small spikes had emerged. Kallos did not know how, or why, but her mind translated these spikes as being covered in runes that labeled different dimensions. Each axis had phantoms and spread outward and away from the infinite flow of Ein Sof. The further away it went, the more fragile its reality became, in the lands of Ayin.

~That’s our Multiverse. All of our dimensions, our alternate timelines, our branching destinies, everything that we know to be reality, is there. The prismatic lights are me. See that larger, dark axis? That is Bob.~

The axis Telos drew Kallos’ attention to had almost twice the size of their own Multiverse, yet for all its size it lacked the dense power of the nascent Multiverse, and its dark electric aura warred with Ein Sof itself. Something about Bob, or his Multiverse, felt inherently wrong. Although there were no scents, both Telos and Kallos had their mind-noses filled with the musty scent. Telos thought it smelled like burnt matches, while Kallos identified ammonia.

-What are the other axis? -

~Multiverses without a Creator, either burgeoning, or fading.~

-Why does this Bob not resonate with Ein Sof, or Ayin? Why can’t there be peace?- The sadness in Kallos’ thoughts made Telos feel a stab of guilt. If not for her, Kallos would never be aware of a higher order existence, and be at peace to think of Pleroma as the highest existence, a place of peace and oneness to balance the tortured existence of the physical, material worlds.

~I don’t know. I thought Binah held all the answers, but I can’t find anything about the River of Light. Maybe Ein Sof itself has another avatar besides me, at the center? Once I kick Bob in the butt, I want to explore that place. You can’t get much more ‘explore my forbidden depths’ than the epicenter of an infinite river of light. What’s it come from?~

-Life is never dull with you, darling. A decade.. Well, the children will be adults, Let’s make sure to make the time count.-

Telos felt her shoulders lighten up, and tension fade. Kallos accepted it better than she had feared, and that made it a bit easier for her to accept these things. Not that acceptance made a difference in their options.