Grant awoke in his mental space. He was standing in the dining room of his former home, exactly where he had been standing last night when Ki had unleashed his power. Ki was across the room in the kitchen stirring a bubbling pot on the stove, wearing a pink apron decorated with swirling roses and tulips, one that Grant remembered his mum owning when he was little. The contrast between this mysterious, alien being, with his dark skin, glowing red marks and metallic fingernails, and the bright, floral sign of domesticity made Grant snort. Ki looked back at him at the sound, mouth widening into a grin.
“Yes, I know, I know,” he said, picking up a salt shaker and adding some to the pot. “Not the most dignified look for me, but frankly, I like normality. Crave it, even, one might say. Your memorial links between the comfort of your mother’s cooking and this apron are deeply embedded, and I wanted to experience some of those warm memories for myself.” He paused, eyes losing focus as he stared into the distance. “I do not remember my parents,” he said quietly, a hint of pain colouring his words. “I did for a long time… but no more. One of the odd things we discovered early on about our powers,” he remarked as he turned off the gas stove, pulled out a bowl and began ladling chicken soup from the pot into it, “was that while we have near-perfect recall of all our experiences on Earth, our memories of our home world were subject to the normal passage of time. No being’s mind, human or otherwise, is designed to hold memories forever, after all. I ended up committing most of my remaining memories to journals relatively early on in my inhabitance of your planet. Sadly, they were burned only a few centuries later, when I was forced to flee Babylon. A shame. I have often wondered if my compatriots were more successful in retaining their memories of our origins.”
Ki poured out another bowl, then walked over to Grant and set a bowl in front of him. Grant took a deep breath, distracted from Ki’s words for a moment by the now semi-familiar rush of nostalgia that hit him. A memory flashed before his eyes for a moment, of his mother serving him this exact chicken soup as a child, when he had been out of school with a nasty head cold. Ki removed his apron, then sat down at the table and began to eat. Grant shook his head slightly to clear it, then joined him.
“I don’t understand though,” he said as he took a sip. “If you have perfect recall of what you do on Earth, surely writing down those memories would count? So wouldn’t you now remember what you wrote forever?”
Ki chuckled. “I apologise. A slight misunderstanding. When I say I ‘committed’ my memories to a journal, I mean that quite literally. I copied the memories into a book, not by writing, but pulled directly from my head. I was still trying, at the time, to keep a low profile, and feared that writing down such words would cause too big a stir if they were ever discovered or translated.”
Grant raised an eyebrow. “So… you made a Horcrux?” he asked with a slight smile.
Ki cocked his head questioningly, before his eyes turned entirely white and began flicking left and right, as though reading an invisible book. After a second, they returned to normal and he smiled back. “Ah, I see. Yes, in a way, I did.” He spooned more soup into his mouth. “Good books,” he added in an offhand way.
Grant nodded in agreement, and a comfortable silence fell as the two of them focused on enjoying the meal in front of them. Even though Grant was aware that he wasn’t really sitting at this table eating, and gaining no nourishment from the food, he nonetheless felt a knot in his stomach he wasn’t even aware he had begin to loosen as the pleasant memories washed over him. After they were done, Ki waved a hand and the bowls disappeared.
“That spoils the illusion of homely comfort somewhat,” Grant commented with a wry smile.
Ki returned the smile briefly before leaning forward and steepling his fingers. “Now,” he said, growing more serious, “I am surprised that you went to sleep straight away. Although I understand - you were so tired I did not even have a chance to say something before you were asleep - I thought we agreed that it was best to try and enact a mental shield as soon as possible.”
Grant grinned. “Well, about that. I had a thought. Actually, hang on - shouldn’t you know what my idea is already?”
Ki shook his head. “It takes concentration on my behalf to keep track of your mind constantly. While I am always paying attention to your interactions, in case I need to act, I do not intercept your thoughts at all times. I will if I feel you are in danger or we need to work together, but otherwise, I will respect your privacy as much as I can while we occupy the same body.”
Grant quirked an eyebrow. “Interesting to talk of respecting privacy, when you had looked through my life’s memories before we even spoke,” he said, more curious than angry about the seeming discrepancy.
Ki nodded. “I did. And I apologised for it, and will again if need be. But it was necessary. Privacy is important, but our mission is more so. Now that we have the measure of each other, however, I am content to let your thoughts be yours unless absolutely necessary.”
Grant shrugged. The feeling of trust that endured beyond his removed memories was as strong as ever, and if Grant had been in the same position, he supposed he would behave similarly. “Well then, back to what I was saying,” he continued. “I had an idea. You’ve said several times that this place is a visual metaphor for my mind. But we know that my Source - you, or your power I guess - is here too, in some way. That's why you were able to release your power in that, frankly, hideously gory display last night. So, I was thinking… Why not try and use my powers while asleep? If my mind is here, and you and the power you give me is here too, why can’t I create a mental shield here? It may even be easier - like, I could imagine a castle all around us and my memories, or something.”
Ki’s eyebrows rose in surprise, before he grew thoughtful. “That… hmmm… that might work. I never thought of trying that… of course, I only shared a body in this way briefly in the past. But if that did work…”
“Well, let’s give it a try,” Grant said enthusiastically.
The two of them walked out into the inky black void of Grant’s subconscious. The space had changed slightly since last night - in addition to the three houses Grant had lived in, there were also a series of odd, stand alone rooms, all of them lacking walls. Grant recognised his school homeroom, his best friend’s living room, and more. Each of them were important locations, places he had spent a lot of time over the years, and even though he hadn’t stepped within their bounds Grant could feel long-faded memories stirring at the sight of them.
“You’ve expanded,” he noted. “I thought you just said you were done digging through my memories?”
“Oh, I am,” Ki assured him. “However, the fact that I have needed to dig up so many memories in such a short time will continue to have effects on this space. You may notice some spectres, memories of people and things, appearing over the next day or two, but they are harmless, meaningless, and will fade over the coming week or so. Possibly even faster, if this experiment of yours works. After all, if you are able to build a mental fortress, it would stand to reason that you could learn to directly manipulate this mental space, similar to how I did when I erected these memories of your houses.”
Grant raised an eyebrow thoughtfully, looking around the still mostly-empty void. “That wouldn’t be a bad idea” he mused. “I mean, I assume we’re gonna be talking relatively frequently, would be nice to have an actual place to do it. But that’s getting ahead of ourselves - let’s focus on this shield for now. So, if we’re building off the visual metaphor idea, I guess a castle is the way to go. Some big, impenetrable fortress, with everything important contained within.”
Ki nodded his agreement. “There are some other intriguing possibilities if this works. We could expand the metaphor even further, create traps, dungeons to capture intruders, maybe even false memories. I am quite excited to experiment.”
Grant cricked his neck from side to side. “Well, if this works, you have my full permission to create the nastiest, trickiest maze of a castle possible. Although - and I hope this goes without saying - don’t go overboard. I mean, I know you’re worried about this enemy you’ve mentioned, but I’m guessing at some point other people, more innocent ones, might try and talk telepathically to teach me or something.”
“Yes, of course,” Ki said, “I have no wish to cause undue harm on the poor souls that have been trapped here. I will be gentle - on the surface levels, at least. But I will be unrelenting if anyone attempts to penetrate further.”
Grant nodded then closed his eyes and reached for his Source. He was expecting it to be easier in this mental space than in the real world, and he wasn’t disappointed. He could feel it immediately, closer than ever, pulsing and swirling in the void. He opened his eyes as an instinct struck him, some kind of intent echoing back from the pool of power. Without quite understanding why, he raised his hand and made a beckoning gesture. There was a moment of silence, and then the slow pulsing that he heard in his mind started to echo around the vast emptiness that surrounded him, thrumming gently. Out in the black, a faint red spot appeared, travelling towards them, growing brighter and brighter in sync with the increasing tempo and volume of the beat that filled the air. Distance was impossible to measure in a space such as this, so Grant was taken by surprise when the red spot suddenly resolved itself into a roiling, swirling tide of thick, vibrant blood. The liquid crashed over the buildings that lay nearby, including the wall-less rooms, yet for all the force it seemingly contained, the impact did nothing. The blood swept across the void without affecting the smallest loose thread, carpeting everything in sight with a thick, viscous sheet of red. The area around Grant and Ki, however, remained clear, a circle of clear black space surrounding each of them. Ki looked at Grant, stunned.
“I… I have never seen the power used like this,” he said, staring at the now red-tinged void. “What did you do?”
Grant shrugged, turning in a slow circle. “I don’t really know,” he replied honestly. “I just… I felt like it was what needed to happen. It was like the power knew what I was trying to do and told me how to summon it.” He frowned, looking over at Ki. “I kind of thought that it was you guiding me. I mean, the power is you, right?”
Ki shook his head slowly. “Not exactly. I contain the power, yes, but once I have granted you access, it is yours as much as it is mine. This is… something new. I have only ever shared my mind like this once before, but he did not wish to experiment or learn to wield his power as you have done. He was content to let me occupy his body whenever we needed to act. All the experimentation and study I did to master my power, I did on my own, but I am certain that even if I wished it, I would not be able to call it forth like you have.” He paused, studying the ground, and a smile began to spread across his face. “It is wondrous.” He glanced at Grant and the smile grew even wider. “This is amazing. Not only do I believe we can do as you planned, creating a mental fortress, but I believe we may have only scratched the surface of the feats we can accomplish.” He clapped his hands together and began to rub them. “Now. Let us begin planning.”
It turned out that Grant’s conception of a castle was quite different from Ki’s. After all, Grant’s exposure was through TV, movies and games, but Ki had seen the construction of actual, genuine military fortresses by some of the most powerful ancient civilisations that had existed. That said, he had missed out on the middle ages, where what Grant thought of as the typical style of castle had been invented. After examining Grant’s memories of his childhood trip to England, along with images from all the fiction he had absorbed, Ki had created a miniature 3D model to hang in the air between them. He had pointed out all the various traps and tricks he had incorporated, along with explanations as to why he had excluded various elements that Grant had taken for granted - the crenellated walls, for example, existed to provide archers firing from the tops of the walls a place to take cover, but in a purely mental construct such as this, they were pointless. Grant was tempted to object on the grounds that he thought they looked cool regardless, but he was won over when Ki pointed out that they could always make aesthetic improvements in the future, whereas if the core layout was flawed, tearing down the entire fortress to change the architecture may be much harder.
Stolen story; please report.
“Although,” Grant said, studying the blueprint as he prepared to begin the attempted construction, “that might not actually be the case. I mean, this is a purely mental space right? Why shouldn’t I be able to change things at a whim? Hell, for that point, who says we have to obey any kind of real world rules? Why can’t I make it bigger on the inside, for instance?”
Ki frowned thoughtfully. “It is possible,” he said hesitantly, “but I would suggest that is something else we experiment with later. I suspect that bending the laws of physics may be acceptable, but I would be careful with completely rebuilding the castle too often. If I were to extend the metaphor, I would say that doing so may possibly be interpreted as being weak of mind, and might actually make it easier for an intruder to gain access.” He thought a moment longer, then shrugged. “That said, I am guessing. This is as new to me as it is to you.” He smiled warmly. “Which is something I have not experienced in a long, long time. Thank you for that.”
“You’re welcome,” Grant replied with a grin. “But maybe wait until we see if this actually works before heaping too much praise.”
Grant took a deep breath, staring at the model, committing it to memory. He closed his eyes, connected with his Source, and pushed.
The thick red liquid reacted instantly. Once more, Grant felt an odd connection with his power, completely unlike the real world, where it had fought against his control as much as possible. Instead, it sensed his desire, reacted to his will, and told him how to achieve it. He opened his eyes once more, raised his hands, and sent his will streaming out. The tide around him began to thin, sliding off the rooms and houses around him, spreading across the floor. As it moved, it transformed, the colour shifting from blood red to stone grey streaked with red veins, this shade closer to the shimmering spots that covered Ki’s skin. The flood spread further, stretching into the distance before beginning to flow upwards in numerous spots, leaving behind walls that soon blocked Grant’s view as the castle continued to grow. Grant dropped to one knee, panting hard as he strained to keep the power flowing, his mental exhaustion after the day’s exercises returning stronger than ever. Ki knelt beside him. “Are you alright, my friend?” he asked, concern etched on his face.
Grant gritted his teeth and nodded, simultaneously fighting through a wave of tiredness and a physical exertion that had him sweating and aching all over. He kept the spell going, looking up as the roof of the fortress began to close in over their heads, some of the fluid dripping down like stalactites before shifting into elegant chandeliers, some pouring down the walls and turning into elegant decorations, fabrics and sconces, bringing colour and light to the hall. Then it was over, and Grant gasped as he felt the power leave his grasp, its task complete.
The pair now stood in the new great hall of Grant’s mind, a space larger than any in a real castle by far, all of the buildings that represented his memories safely stored within its four walls. Portraits dotted the hall, most representing people and places that Grant missed from back home, a feature he had added so he would be motivated to escape Sanctuary every time he returned here.
Ki stood, walked over to the nearest wall and placed his hand upon it, pressing lightly before nodding in satisfaction.
“Excellent work,” he proclaimed, facing Grant with growing excitement. “I can tell that this will be more than sufficient for now. With time enough to develop the traps and reinforce the walls, you will have the most secure mind ever to exist, I am certain.”
Grant waved a hand in acknowledgement, too tired to muster any enthusiasm at his success. “Awesome,” he gasped, slowly getting to his feet as he caught his breath. “So that means we can talk in public now, right? And that you can return my memories to me?”
Ki nodded. “Yes, I believe so. However, not all at once. This is a strong foundation, but do not underestimate the power our enemy wields. Too many secrets revealed all at once will still cause your mind to resonate, and possibly draw attention before we can fully secure this fortress. But, yes, you have more than earned some enlightenment.”
He walked over to Grant, laying his hand on his shoulder. “Rest now. We will discuss your new memories in the morning.” Ki snapped his fingers.
Ki and Grant were seated at his childhood table. “My name is Ki,” Ki began. “Or, at least, that is a name I have used. One of many over the years. I am one of the Numen.”
Grant took a bite of his memory-pizza as Ki continued.
"Numen," Ki said, "is just one of the names we have had over the years, though it is our preference. There are many others. The Trimurti, the Asgard, the Olympians. All names that humanity has assigned to us over the centuries we walked among them."
Grant dropped his pizza and stared at Ki, dumbfounded. "You mean… gods. You're saying you're a god."
Ki rocked his hand back and forth in a so-so gesture. "In some sense. It is more accurate to say that we were the inspiration for your gods. Most of them, at least. But much of the mythology that sprung up around us is… embellished. We didn't create your world, or create humanity, or any such nonsense. But we did… guide your development. Altered certain trajectories. But that comes later. First, I should tell you how we came to this universe.
"We are not of your world. Our home is in an alternate dimension, from a world far more advanced than your own. We were originally… just people. Ordinary people - not humans, but people nonetheless. I -" He paused, looking slightly disconcerted. "- I cannot actually remember my original body completely. Something akin to your reptiles, I seem to recall, but larger, with more arms and no tail. I do not remember my world, or my family, or even if I had a family. The foibles of memory. Many of the personal details are lost to time. What I do remember is that we were explorers, the lot of us. Our scientists had successfully constructed a wormhole network some years prior, and we were to be the first group to use it in a jump to a planet outside of our solar system. There were forty-four of us.
"Something… happened, just as we were set to travel. I have no idea what, precisely. The wormhole was created, but it malfunctioned. The field expanded, mutated, drawing us in. There was no escape. We were ripped from our home, our bodies shredded in an instant, but our minds… they flew. We flew through time, through space, across the surface of suns, seeing our universe shift and vibrate as time swept us along in its wake. We saw our race spread throughout the galaxy, saw our home world die, consumed by our sun, we few unimportant sacrifices long forgotten. But as we observed this, only mere moments passed for us as we drifted outside of our reality. Until, without warning, we hit a barrier. The wall between our worlds. To this day, I have no idea how we managed to break through, but we did. Our minds came together, and our drive, our will, smashed through dimensional walls and sent us hurtling into your galaxy.
"We… floated, would be the best term. We were mere consciousnesses, no bodies, no substance. It was… difficult. We struggled for a long time, screaming into the nothingness, trying to find our way home. Eventually, we began to accept our circumstances, and soon discovered that we were not as helpless as we had assumed. We could feel and sense and experience so much, more than we could comprehend at the time. Something had happened as we shifted universes, and our awareness had expanded. We could see through layers of reality, and as we experimented we sensed that this new universe was made up of a different kind of matter to our own. A matter that we felt sure we should be able to manipulate, laid bare in front of us. But we found that our minds alone were not as powerful as we felt they ought to be, and despite our best efforts, we were unable to exert our will upon our new universe. Something was holding us back.
"So, we did our jobs when faced with an unknown environment. We explored. We could fly through space at will, unbound by the laws of physics. A few of us separated from the group, heading off to explore the far-flung reaches of your universe. The rest of us stuck together, searching. What we were searching for, we didn't really understand, but there was an instinct, a necessity, driving us on. We saw millions of planets, thousands of lifeforms, some barely more than a cell, some that had spread across their solar system as we once had, beginning to truly master space. And, eventually, we found Earth."
Ki paused once more, studying Grant. "Are you okay? Need some time to process this?"
Grant's mouth hung open. He realised he was gawping at the - apparently - literal god opposite him. He closed his mouth and swallowed dryly. "Umm… kind of? It's just… a lot." He ran a hand over his face, trying to readjust. "Okay, so. Alternate reality, wormhole accident, godly minds floating in space. Not that much crazier than portal doors and magic I guess, in the grand scheme of things. Okay, I'm good. I'm good. I'm… okay. Keep going."
Ki smiled gently. "It is a lot, I know. Even more so for you, judging from your memories. Your ancestors were far more willing to accept our existence, but your current society is much more fixed by certain perceived truths. But this is good. That was my plan, after all.” He paused, considering what he had just said before shaking his head. “But that comes later. First, our arrival.”
"So," Ki continued, "we found Earth. And, more importantly, we found humanity. A primitive world - small pockets were just beginning to develop a written language by the time we arrived. But you were what we had been searching for, without knowing. I don't know why your minds sang to us so much more strongly than the thousands of other species we had encountered, but they did. It was like we were missing a piece, the final connection that would allow us to exert our influence on the fabric of reality, and that piece was humanity. We could communicate with each other easily enough - we all occupied the same intra-dimensional space, after all. After examining your world for a while, we found a small tribe with precisely the right number of bodies to accommodate us. And we took them."
"You mean you killed them," Grant interrupted angrily.
"In many ways, worse," Ki said sadly. "Their minds remained, but trapped within their bodies, buried by our presence. Trapped in a space much like we now occupy.” He gestured out the window at the dark void beyond. “In our own, very poor, defence, we did not realise that at the time - but we did think that they had been killed, although they were so primitive I am sorry to say we viewed them as little more than animals. We only found out many years later that the host minds remained trapped, and by that point most of us - them - didn't care. At the time, however, we had little to no understanding of our abilities or situation, and we had no concept of the ramifications of our actions. It was quite disconcerting, really. We had seen stars burn away and civilisations that spread across the galaxy, yet we were as babes when it came to the nuances of our power and our new world. Your world.
"So we experimented. We had unlocked our ability to manipulate our environment, and we took full advantage. We reshaped the land we had come across into a sort of testing ground, and we spent decades testing the limits of our new found powers. We were not scientists, but I must say I did appreciate the thrill of discovery and experimentation that we felt at the time. We found that we had affinities for different aspects of reality, different ways that our minds could perceive and alter things. We found that our new bodies were near invulnerable, strong, fast. And, eventually, we found other humans.
"You cannot imagine the rush," Ki whispered, eyes unfocused as he remembered, "of being seen as a god. I cannot remember which of us first encountered other humans, but seeing how they were worshipped… It was addictive. We soon spread out across the globe, revealing ourselves to peoples all over the world. The way they looked at us, Grant… the praise they heaped upon us. With our abilities, we wanted for nothing, creating food or gold out of thin air, but, the admiration, the adoration… the fear. We were obsessed.
"At first, we were benevolent, mostly. We protected our tribes, punished those who wronged us, taught them some basic ways of improving their lives, all while experimenting more with our powers. Eventually, as we grew more confident, we reached the ultimate pinnacle. We began to create new life forms. At first though, we had to experiment. Some of our experiments turned out beautiful, elegant… but some were just… cruel. You have seen one of them already, the Gryphons. An early experiment, magically fusing two animals together. Lots of our first attempts were like that, but as you saw they were poorly made. Disfigured, grotesque in some ways. I saw the beauty in many of our efforts, but most often their creators abandoned them for other pursuits, more aesthetically pleasing experiments.
“I am sorry to say, in those early days, I was nearly as bad as the others. I was not necessarily cruel or evil, just… curious. And uncaring. Exploring my new world, protecting my flock - not out of a sense of morality, just because they would worship me all the more every time I destroyed their enemies. Eventually, we realised that instead of killing our enemies, we should convert them. Demonstrate our powers, subjugate their systems of belief, gather more and more followers. Soon after this, as I said, we discovered that our host’s minds were trapped within us, screaming into the void, most of them driven mad by decades of imprisonment. After having just spent some time in a similar situation, as a consciousness incapable of true interaction, I was horrified, disgusted by the torment I had unknowingly inflicted on this poor soul. Many of the others, however, were not. Instead, they simply continued experimenting, studying how exactly our hosts functioned, and why we could possess them. Then one of us discovered what would be the beginning of our brightest age, and your darkest. They found that we were not limited to one host. We could have multiple - and the more hosts we took, the more our power grew. That was the beginning of our true cruelty, our darkest age. But while my fellows were experimenting with their power, growing more and more heartless with every day, I had met the person who would help me realise how despicable our actions had become. My first host, and my first friend in the universe. Isaiah.”