The bodies of crystalline dragons brushed against hers in welcome as they whispered to her in voices made of wind and rain.
Eternity passed, the dragons and elements accompanying her falling away one by one until she flew alone through a sea of darkness. Ennui replacing her isolation until gradually she no longer felt anything.
Ever forward, she flew, her monotony only broken when she encountered a chasm in time and space that seemed to call her name. For the first time in forever, she felt something new.
Anticipation.
The face of a woman with copper colored hair pulled back from her face, small tendrils sticking out here and there, appeared. Bright green eyes met hers.
That’s me,Tate thought distantly.
Pain embedded itself along her bones. The knowledge that her long existence was coming to an end.
A piece of her was broken. No, not her. This world was wrong. Backwards.
She needed something; she didn’t know what. Something had called her to this place. A different woman tricked her, breaking her further.
She’d escaped but now couldn’t return.
Despairing, she cast around for a lifeline. An anchor. Something. Anything that would offer light in this dark place.
An answering spark came from the woman above her. A vast lake of potential that called her name.
Compelled by necessity and greed, she dove for it. Not waiting for permission, uncaring whether the other would object. All that mattered was her survival.
She crouched in her chosen, looking out over a battlefield drenched in blood, bodies wearing the same uniform as the woman she inhabited strewn across the ground like neglected toys.
The woman fell to her knees, great wracking sobs tearing at her chest. “What did you make me do?”
“Get rid of her. She’s driving you mad,” a woman with hair the color of gold demanded.
A man stood next to the woman. Taller by nearly a head with a scruffy beard shadowing his jaw. His eyes, like the woman’s, were dead inside.
“She’ll die.”
“She’s a monster, Tate. You never should have tried to save her in the first place. Don’t you remember what she did to me,” the woman argued.
“I’m not abandoning her.”
A mind comforted hers. “Shh, it’s not your fault. They were descending on a path of no return. We did what we had to do.”
They will hate you for this. They won’t understand.
“I know,” the woman with copper hair said, her voice hardening. “They will send us to sleep.”
Silence.
You could save yourself. All you have to do is give in to their will and abandon me.
The woman shut her eyes, cutting off her vision of the other world. “It’s best this way. I’m tired of fighting and killing. Their never-ending expectations. No matter how much we struggle it never seems to change.”
She withdrew, not knowing how to respond. She’d hated the woman for so long, putting the blame for her fate on her. In reality, it was the opposite. She’d twisted the woman’s future in her desire to survive, costing her, her spot in the sun.
The woman touched her. “Don’t worry. I have a plan.”
The dream tore and Tate came awake, blinking away the sleep as she slowly became aware of her surroundings. She lay face down on her bed, Ryu curled around her.
She remained still for several seconds, gaining her bearings. The time after Ryu saying he’d take her home was mostly a blur.
