Once upon a time, there were gods on Earth.
Gods that knew and understood human suffering, gods that fought alongside their believers, gods that helped those in need, gods that listened to the prayers of their faithful and answered, helped.
Once upon a time there were gods of war and wrath, tricksters both kind and cruel, students and teachers and creators and crafters and much much more.
Usually, they were very horny.
Once upon a time, there was more kindness.
Then, once upon a time, they were killed. Killed by both outsiders of their religions, people who believe their one and only God was the most righteous, and by their own people, who forgot them because they were forced to or because they simply chose to.
But, even now, thousands of years later, some of their stories are still remembered. They may not have the power they once had, but they are not completely gone. Just… resting. Sleeping and playing among themselves, remembering what once was, all in places that mere humans could never see: islands beyond the veil of reality, places built out of stories even older than the gods themselves, reminisced with the help of a Traveler who forsook his powers over Dreams to help these righteous beings. For they deserved more, better.
Once upon a time, there was a god in Africa, and his name was Anansi. The Spider God. Trickster, rainbringer and storyteller, all stories were his for he had won the right to them. His stories made people smile and brought sunshine even at night, yet he knew the darkness that came when the moon didn’t shine and the stars winked away behind the clouds. He knew evil and monsters, predators and prey. He had been both, after all.
And, because of that, when his brothers and sisters and mother and father and children slowly began to go to sleep, he remained, left behind, for he lived in every story that ever was and ever will be. Sometimes he was just a small webweaver in a corner of a room where the protagonists spoke, other times he was an old man telling the traveler the way before disappearing in the fog. Still other times, he was the protagonist. Always, in those cases, the story had a happy ending.
So it was that Anansi walked the world and wondered: “How can I save my brethren? How can I help them not be forgotten?”
The answer, naturally, was as simple as answers come: he had to remember them all, and he had to tell all of their stories.
He did just that. He was hunted, of course, by the followers of that one and only God, whose name sometimes was God, other times Allah, or even Yahweh. A vindictive being who, in his stories, killed the whole world because he couldn’t live with his mistakes and couldn’t, like every other god before him, come down from his ivory tower to solve the issue himself. An idiot because, as his first act upon the creation of humanity, he chose to test them in his paradise for no real reason. A god who had given free will to all of humanity, and didn’t try to guide them towards a better future, uncaring of the pain men wrought upon themselves.
Anansi disliked this God. Too stuck up, too high and mighty and, truly, too distanced from his creations. In the millennia he had walked on earth, from the time when the world still had an edge, to the modern age where humans could fly among the clouds like birds, he had seen his priests rise in power and forget the meaning of what they did, craving money more than they craved to help their people.
He had watched and, all the while, told the stories of his old friends.
He had learned to disguise them among the works of that God’s monks.
He had created new stories, changing his friends’ appearances while keeping them as they were.
And, when the eras changed, when the churches of that God had begun to become just fixtures, with people no longer truly believing the words spouted by those priests, he had found people who needed guidance, and helped in making them new gods. He still remembered fondly the time when he had convinced a random crocodile around St Louis in the americas to become one of the gods for those Louisiana Voodoo worshippers.
He still remembered drinking and smoking cigars with Papa Gleba (or was it Liba? They were oh so indecisive with the names they gave).
He still remembered their Mumbas and their rites. There was true belief there. True love and community, like there had been once upon a time.
But they had disappeared too.
And then, seeing how little the world cared about gods now, how they were considered, at most, stories, he had decided to leave. He walked one last time the Roads Less Traveled and stepped into the Void Between.
There he had built one last web. A grand web to unite worlds and stories, that he may be the last one standing to remember them all.
There he had met the Traveler, a god who had once ruled everything that Wasn’t, who had seen worlds die because of his idiocy and who, in the end, had given up so much in an attempt to not repeat the same mistake again.
But this isn’t the story of the Traveler. This is Anansi’s story.
And Anansi still remembered meeting a fox. She was an old mother who had had many children. A mother who grieved, for she had outlived many of them. A mother who attempted to trick him into helping her fulfill her greatest wish.
A mother, who had succeeded.
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“Yep Albert, I’m cursed,” said Alice very matter of factly as she looked in the face of a very angry and probably very knife-happy arachne.
Silence fell over the group, tense as a guitar string. The jorogumo (because that was actually how Alice had recognized the arachne) was staring murder into their eyes. How she could do that to both of them while only having two was a mystery. One she didn’t want to find the answer to. Not right now.
“Ok, ok, there’s clearly been a misunderstanding here,” began Albert raising his hands in the air. She couldn’t see his face, naturally, but she knew for sure he was scared by the way his mask’s eyes had dilated.
On the other hand Alice felt… calm. What was there to be scared of? This was still a Dream after all: nothing could really hurt her. She was instead very curious about what she was looking at.
“Look. Look. Erm… ah, yes! Fifth Amendment of the Silken Dream Deal: [Dreamers] who stumble upon a dream or Mind Palace of the arachne by accident are immune to any and all punishments that may be inflicted upon their minds and souls. They are to immediately be released.
“We had no intention of entering this dream. This novice here chanced upon it while we were escaping a battlefield.”
The arachne in front of them raised her eyebrows questioningly: “The Airm are you talking about?”
Albert began sweating.
“Oh gods, oh Soma. You’re a newborn. Fuck. That complicates things. You don’t know what I’m talking about, right?”
That’s more or less when the other arachne appeared. She was a small thing with chestnut hair and a chestnut colored spider half. Her eyes, too, were a light brown, even though sometimes, when she batted her eyelids, it almost looked like one of them was red or green.
Albert saw her too because, suddenly, he stopped talking to himself and trying to find a way out of what was, apparently, a problem.
“...I am confused,” he simply said, “Why is there two of you here?”
“Because she is me,” answered the new arrival matter-of-factly.
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“We are two souls in the same body. Not that you simple humans could understand,” added the murderous-looking arachne.
“Wait, does that mean there were others like us Siidi?”
“Is… Sister! Don’t say our names. They’re [Dreamers], they can use those against us,” she shouted in answer.
“Erm… no, we can’t. Silken Dream Deal, Second Amendment. We [Dreamers] are forbidden from interfering in any way with arachne in the Land of Dreams. Same goes for your species. Look, I don’t know how this happened, it’s been literal Ages since the Deal was signed, you lot simply disappeared from the Dream and I’m pretty sure we are the first to find an arachne’s dream in the last few thousands of years.
“So how about we forget this ever happened and the two of us just leave?”
Silence fell on the small group.
Then the chestnut arachne spoke: “Why are you bound to me?” she asked, pointing at Alice.
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The Mother Fox spoke to Anansi: “O’ great storyteller, immortal Anansi, heed the request of an old mother, would you?”
Anansi, who had always been a family man at heart, especially in his own stories, agreed solemnly to do so.
“All my life I strived to help and defend my pups. I taught them how to hunt, how to attack prey and when to run and hide. I did all in my power, and still many died. So please, fulfill this dying mother’s wish, and help protect her pups and their children to come.”
Anansi thought. One doesn’t become a trickster without being craftier than most. And he was the craftiest and most intelligent of them all. Once upon a time, he had managed to steal Tiger’s balls, leaving the damnable animal his small Spider balls, and then escaped with the prize by having the Monkeys sing a song about stealing Tiger’s balls.
With his craftiness and genius he had won the right to Stories from Tiger.
He was intelligent. Truly.
But we should not forget how, once upon a time, during a dark night, he saw a stranger taunting him in a tar statue built by his son to capture a thief of peas, trapping himself in an attempt to punch it.
He was neither a genius nor perfect and all knowing.
“I agree, old woman. I shall protect your kits and their children. Show them to me.”
The old fox mother sighed in gratitude, then slumped to the ground, her old heart finally beginning to give out. But, before exhaling her last breath, she said: “I am old, o’ great and crafty Anansi. My mind is fogged by age, my memories hidden under the mud of decades. I fear I do not remember the faces of my children, only their smell. I fear, great Anansi, that you’ll have to check them all to be sure.”
Having outsmarted Anansi, she closed her eyes and died.
Anansi laughed.
And began looking for the old fox’s kits. He had given his word after all.
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Who were these people? What did Siidi mean when she talked about [Dreamers]?
Actually, how had they entered here?This was her mind!
Was it a spell? Maybe? Who could tell. She was so new to this magic stuff. Ugh! Grandmother said the possibilities for spells were endless.
So she did the only logical thing: she activated her [Mana Sight].
The world around… wasn’t filled with strings. She wasn’t overwhelmed by endless amounts of information, nor was she blinded by hundreds of thousands of connections between her and the world and everything.
There was only a chestnut colored strings binding her and Siidi together, a stark white string disappearing out into the sky of her mind and, finally, a yellow string that faded in and out of existence, as if uncertain. That string was connected to the girl wearing the fox mask.
“Why are you bound to me?” she asked.
Everyone stopped right in their tracks, staring right at her as if she’d just shouted the most horrible expletive known to a sailor.
She shrugged the attention off and pointed at the girl.
“Who are you? Do we know each other?”
The girl inclined her head at her, then shook it.
“If I’d ever seen someone like you I would remember it. So nope, not seen you. I’m Garda by the way, nice to meet you!” she walked fearlessly towards her and extended a hand in greeting.
Isse blinked in surprise, then shrugged and shook the hand back.
“Nice name. I’m Issekina, but you can just call me Isse. The one that wants to kill you is the other half of my soul, Siidi.”
“Isse shut the fuck up, didn’t I tell you not to tell a [Dreamer] your name? They can use it against you!”
“No we can’t, actually,” interjected Albert, “We are bound to silence by the Silken Deal. Its signing was witnessed by the First Dealmaker herself, and we are bound by her Skills to the terms.”
That seemed to calm Siidi immediately: “The First Dealmaker herself? You do realize there are consequences to calling upon her for a deal untouched by her, right?”
“Do you see an old man around here?”
Isse and Garda stared at the two as if they were speaking another language. Which, actually, they were. Isse and Siidi spoke in Irevian, while Garda and Albert spoke in Evarion, Eva’s official tongue. But this was the Dream: such barriers didn’t exist. And, if that wasn’t enough, the System had gifted these
“Alright, I trust you, [Dreamer], but you must leave immediately,” said Siidi.
“Ow, do we? I like her,” Garda pouted and pointed at Isse, “She’s fluffy. She’s also, like, the second type of non-human living being I see. Are you some kind of spider beastkin?”
Siidi, pale little Siidi, changed color so fast, turning a very angry red, that for a moment both Alice and Isse feared she would pass out or something like that.
“WE ARE ARACHNE! DON’T YOU DARE COMPARE US TO THOSE ANIMALS FROM EVA!”
“But you’re also part animal. Like, spider,”” she motioned with both her hands towards the angry arachne’s spider half.
“We’re not the same thing!”
“Well, actually, she doesn’t sound very wrong,” interjected Isse.
“Oh please. Those tribals are nothing like us!”
“I work for one of ‘those tribals’. He’s an excellent alchemist, I’ll have you know!” Garda crossed her arms in fake-anger, then began laughing.
“I actually agree with the big scary arachne here. They are not beastkin, and we should really leave,” spoke up Albert.
“But they’re so interesting! Will I see more of your kind around?” she asked Isse.
That seemed to dampen the relatively light mood of the place. Well, if you can call ‘Cloudy with a chance of murder’ light mood. Siidi shook her head sadly, while Isse shuffled in place.
“Let’s hope not, Garda,” answered Albert.
“What? Why?”
“Because the Dream is the only place where humanity and the arachne ever managed to make peace. Outside, in the Waking World, we are still at war. An ancient war.”
“I wouldn’t hurt her!” said Isse, pouting at the ground.
“Then you’re a fool, Issekina, for there are few out there who wouldn’t kill you on sight. Or call someone to do that for them. I am sorry,” Albert’s voice sounded dejected.
Then he stepped towards the little arachne and offered her his hand: “Still, it was nice seeing one of your kind again. It’s been decades since I last had the honor.”
Hesitantly, she gripped his hand back.
“[Gift From the Other Side],” he whispered.
When their hands separated, Isse found herself holding a small figurine resembling a fox.
“We leave, Garda. May our paths never cross anew,” he turned around, waving his hand goodbye. Alice hurried behind him, fog appearing out of nowhere, turning them first into shadows and then nothing at all.
Then they were out.
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“You have not seen anything tonight Garda, alright?”
“Why?”
“Because, if ever you speak to anyone about this, people will hunt you down and try to find a way to locate those arachne. For that reason you will never speak to anyone about what we just saw, alright?”
“...Alright.”
“Good. I feel like, for tonight, we’ve trained enough.”
Alice nodded. But, secretly, she smiled, putting a hand in the pocket of her nightgown. Holding a small button hidden inside.
A small button with an invisible thread tied to it.
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When she woke up, Isse found herself sandwiched between Anda and Sila, as comfortable as she could ever wish to be.
But she felt something strange in her hands.
With sleep filled eyes, she looked down at the hand not currently under Anda and saw something bright orange: a carved, wooden, fox.
[Gift From the Other Side]. What an interesting Skill. He must be a really caring man, said Siidi.
Isse couldn’t agree more.