A world of webs and misty lights muddle together in the doorway of memories. Colors of erie shapes and images come together to form a warm white globe, sealing me off from the tortuous chamber and encapsulating me.

Silhouettes of the past haunt my vision.

I blink and Theron is standing on one side of my cot, one woven of thread from the world wars, tattered with holes and soaked in blood.

"We have to find a way to get you out of this," he whispers, trying to touch the chains holding me down. Where his hand passes through me, a vision of the real world can be caught in his watery reflection.

Closing my eyes, I try to convince myself of the same things I once did. It's been 97 years. I will not allow this to continue three more.

Yet when I try again, Theron stays, an infuriated look crossing his face as he attempts more aggressively to grab my chains. "Things are only going to get worse with you trapped here..."

"You're not real..." I answer solemnly. "Surely it doesn't matter how fast I get out of here to you."

"You don't understand what he's done to you, Iridian. You need to get out of here before the visions start."

A dry laugh escapes my lips. "Haven't they already begun?"

"You always were this stubborn, weren't you?"

My eyebrow quirks up, challenging him ever so slightly to try it again.

A jolt of pain strikes down my spine and legs, fracturing out and wrapping around to grip the front of my body in a chaotic bout of seizures. Carving into the major arteries and burning me from the inside out, I feel my body being catapulted deep into the sea.

Bubbles and warm tides toss me around, the green eyes watching in horror above the shoreline.

Twisted and thrashed in the current, my eyes land on the sunken temple beneath me. Pumping my arms, once, twice, I feel myself swimming down towards the very building threatening my sanity and life.

Lindon.

Flicking my fingers in the water, I watch the electricity of gold and red shoot down and through the doors.

Real... It feels real...

"Iridian!"

The voice resembles Theron's, but he's not who I see looking up.

A thin stream of my blood slips through the depths of water, wriggling upwards as if it were a snake.

My consciousness is waning very quickly, pressure caving in on all sides, and nothing but the vision of a blurry temple beneath me. My body struggles not to give out, legs kicking a few times per minute only to fade again.

Lindon could be nearly dead, thinking I'm dead...

The sea warps in my ears with noise and I turn to see Daniel shooting towards me. Confused, I try to blink a more detailed view and lose most of my surroundings entirely in bubbles. My eyes won't focus beyond my nose.

My mind flickers between images of being held hostage and the Demi-god in front of me.

Gripping my shoulders tight, he continues to drag me down towards the door, ignoring the questions reeling through my head about the depths and his lifeforce. Deeper and deeper, this suffocation stirring up nausea and discomfort.

My stomach flips, more blood slipping out of my mouth, panic powering through my entire body. Lindon will hurt Daniel at this rate. He needs to get away. Far away. Yet every attempt I yield to send messages into his mind fails.

Limbs finally begin to shut down, refusing to help for even function. It has to be this way, everything must be this way.

I feel vigorous movements, so intense, so painful, yet even they cannot keep my spirit in this vessel. The door impounds itself and crashes open, the water surging into a frenzy, yet not entering the compartment.

Deep into the contained darkness, a pair of searing golden eyes blink.

My body freezes as the man, strong as ever rises from the floor and destroys his chains, launching out and grabbing my throat with insane speed. He slams me through mounds of sand and the roots of trees, scrapes forming all over my body only to heal.

Lindon's eyes glaze over, the rims of gold corrupting with red.

Sanity gone.

Soul empty.

I swallow a final breath, tears pooling up in my eyes. "My Love..."

He yanks forwards and punches my head against the ground, forcing me to see black.

My back arches, spitting up blood on the metal table, my breathing ragged and torso contorting in agony. Blinking to life, Theron stands there with sadness holding his features.

All I can see are the eyes I love so dearly, so broken. Staring me in the face. Attempting to end my life.

Every single time I close my eyes.

An awful sob escapes me, tears falling down my cheeks.

"Iridian, the world needs you. Daniel and Remi need you. Lindon needs you," Theron tries again in a fading voice. His image flickers as if it's about to be consumed. "You have to see past the illusions."

Lindon's grip on my throat is the only feeling left, skin numbing itself for survival.

"None of this is real!" He yells, a raspy growl carrying his voice.

If Lindon is too far gone...

If there is nothing left to do but die...

As if he could read through my thoughts, Theron solidifies for only a moment to grab and shake my ankles. I feel the cool, rough edges of his hands on shins and stiffen.

"You do NOT get to give up, Ira! You do not get to give up on this world! On the people who need you! They will die, Iridian! They will die if you do not see the truth!"

My entire being felt as if I've been drowned at sea, dragged over hot coals, and crushed from the inside out. Yet when Theron's hands touch my skin it all disappears if only for a moment in time.

As if he were a true ghost, standing before me in an attempt to defy his own loss.

I flinch for a moment, considering the absence of pain.

Slowly, the sharp carving begins again, tearing through my bones this time. It compresses them, a throbbing pushing out from blood onto the skin. The echo hurts throughout every cell of my vessel as if my soul feels this is enough to make us leave.

Yet it stopped in his hands.

The static of his presence concerns and manipulates my brain. He flickers in and out of vision for a minute before settling again.

The dark green undershirt, brown overcoat, and all.

For the first time, I see the clarity in his eyes, the lack of slouching, and the regaining of strength and composure. Surely he wouldn't be so miserable dead as he was alive.

"You're the one who has come for me? The spirit meant to aid me? You barely like me."

A tiny smile quirks up the left side of his lips. "I was the only one with the balls to tell a Goddess what to do."

Another slow, methodical blink and he does not waver like the varying images and hallucinations threatening to consume us again.

I feel the wind change around us, swirling and whipping my hair in my face before suddenly throwing me into a standing position in the middle of scrambling and crying commoners.

Hundreds of people shoving into and past me as they run down the cobblestone streets of New Delhi and scuttle around in an attempt to find their belongings and children.

My eyebrows furrow in confusion. The dust roads are different, the buildings slightly changing and shifting in shape. "These nightmares are not my own," I find myself muttering. "Though I do not understand who would be afraid of such things, perhaps the loss of control or..."

Remi stands at the base of our complex, Meika pulling on a pack and as much of their items as she can carry. Both have their eyes drawn to me, focusing heavily. Yet I knew it was not me they were so intently fixated on.

I could not move, could hardly breathe.

Daniel's figure phasing in and out of my own imaginary body.

"Theron, how much of this is real...?" I ask.

He shakes his head, eyes meeting mine and searching nothing. "I cannot see what you see, Iridian. I don't know."

"You don't see the townspeople panicking? The chaos?"

Theron shakes his head again. "Even if I could go look, I have no idea if I could make it back to your side for you to hear about it."

I try to collect my thoughts. My fingers clench, releasing as I exhale. "You are attached to me because I am the Goddess of Death. I am the eternal gateway between this world and the next and you've yet to fully pass through me. You are real, is that what I am to understand?"

"Yes," Theron says, "I'm real, I-I couldn't stand leaving her, leaving any of you behind."

I focus on the blurry image of Meika ushering the young woman out of town, glaring back in my general direction and beckoning me after her.

As if stuck in place, Daniel looks back and forth, my gaze with him.

He stares directly at the Tavern I entered that night and then back. One lasting bark from Meika startles him into motion and I find Daniel running after her.

Only to be pierced through the heart.

His vision gives out on the silver sword we'd both recently been acquainted with.

I choke on the air around me again, thrashing around and yanking against the confinements.

"He's-He's dead," I say, voice giving out.

The pressure of the tears pounding in my eyes but not falling is painful in and of itself. Daniel... His heart tore clean through the center...

"Iridian, you don't know..."

"I-I felt.., it... I felt it!"

"Don't argue with me, you know the poison running through you is more demented than Kiel killing his own Son. I'm sure Dan is fine."

"You don't know! You don't know anything, Theron! You're not here!"

He grits his teeth and turns around, taking a few steady breaths. "I know. I know I'm not there and I'm sorry for that. I'd like to believe if I was we wouldn't have stayed in this mess long enough for you to go after Kiel. But I also know you're stubborn, impatient, and led by the craving for revenge. This isn't the time for you to lose yourself, Iridian. This is the time for you to get yourself together and find them. Find Lindon."

The anger and frustration lash out inside of me, aiming to take hits at the dead man. They fight my tongue for a voice, but the panic and worry can only go so far without understanding.

He's not here to protect Remi.

He's not here to do anything, but then again. He is.

Theron stands before me, offering the last shred of himself he has left.

"I'm sorry... But there's no way out of this..."

Theron rolls his eyes. "How could you give up so easily? Did you and Lindon just submit to being captured?"

"Of course not but-!"

"No, there is no but. We figure this out now, we get you out of this hellhole now, before it's too late. You promised me you would protect her, Ira. You promised me you were going to protect Remi. So you have to get up."

I swallow back the iron in my throat, the pain electrifying my brain once more. I don't want to give up, I want to get out of this and carry out his will. Theron gave me one job.

A job I have no idea how to fulfill.

He lit a spark beneath me, however. He fueled the flames ever so slightly.

Perhaps everything wasn't a dream.

As the darkness consumes my vision, submerging me in a restless slumber of fitful tremors, I feel one step closer to destroying the world and rebuilding it from the ashes.

One step closer to leading Daniel and Remi into the light.

Hello, Lovely Destroyers!

I'm sorry it's been so long again, I know how badly I wanted to finish this story before the Watty's. I'm still going to try, but with Oregon being on fire and Covid, I've been so very busy. Please send your love and support in this time... I know I don't often ask, but my friends and family have had their homes burnt to the ground, my town is constantly under threat of evacuation, and I'm truly scared for the first time in a long time. 

I hope everyone is safe and sound, I love you guys so much. 

Have a good night everyone <3 - Aria