Alexandra and the Gods of Earth: Book One

Beloved

"You are your best thing." - Toni Morrison, Beloved

The grass, tall and thick, swayed in an audible breeze. The wind itself was light and cool, perfectly matching the warm summer temperature, despite it being winter in the northern hemisphere. The music it made as it swam through the stalks of green gave the feeling of a large storm approaching... Or perhaps one had just passed. The sky above was a mixture of streaking oranges and pinks, giving of the light of a dying sunset, or perhaps it was the light of an early dawn. This place, whatever it was, was a place where time did not seem to exist... and yet time was happening. All of time it seemed, as if it had a physical presence, all at once. It was a place in between places. A single space shared between multiple spaces. It was the place Alex found herself in.

She became aware of herself slowly, and then all at once, as if she had just awoken from a dream. Her fingers tightened and clenched around the grass that had flattened beneath her body. It was soft, more soft than grass had a reason to be. Her forehead scrunched with lines of effort as she was finally able to unglue her eyes. She laid face down in the tall grass. The sound of an ever flowing breeze was her only company. Alex shifted and then slowly, wary of her own body, she raised herself to her knees. One hand to her head and one to her ribs, she waited for the inevitable wave of pain that was sure to happen now that she was awake. She waited five seconds, and then ten. She looked down at herself to discover there were no rips or tears in her clothes, like there had to have been after the thrashing she just received, and realized that maybe she had actually fall asleep. There was no pain, not even the irritating twinge of healing bruises. So... maybe this was a dream?

Alex looked around as she pulled herself up to her feet. This was the most realistic dream she had ever had, if so... but what else could it be? She was still in China, on the Fairy Bridge, as she recalled it's name. At least, it looked like the bridge. Except the sides of the natural land formation seemed to go on in every direction, as if she were actually in some kind of field. The greens of the grass were too emerald. In fact, all of the colors she could see just seemed a tad over saturated. The sounds of the rushing water, from the river that should have been just below her, were absent from the area. Alex looked left, and then right. The natural border of trees were still there on either side, but...they were taller and more dense than she remembered. She looked up at the cloudless sky. Her eyes widened at the sunset-rise, as it should have been night, she had to have been laying there for hours by now, but what had really caught her attention were the stars.

There were thousands of them, breaking past the barrier of dying-rising sunlight. Sure she had seen stars before the moon had fully risen, but this was something different all together. This was more than she had ever seen before! A bunch of them were collected together like a streak that curved around an edge of the sky and Alex realized she was seeing the arm of the galaxy, stretched out before her.

Whichever galaxy this is. she thought.

It couldn't be the Milkyway she was seeing. She had spent a lot of time looking up at the night sky since she had become spirit. She had become used to the stars and how the night sky looked at different parts of the year. This was not a sky she had ever seen before. Despite it not being night time yet, or any specific time for that matter, she could see swirls of colors that existed past the colors of the atmosphere above her. There were greens and blues, purples and pinks, other colors the human eye should not be able to make out. She was definitely not in Kansas anymore. Perhaps she wasn't even on Earth. Alex took a shuddering breath, one that filled her lungs with warm, sweet air, as she came to a depressing halt. Was this...was she...?

She remembered the fight with Prometheus, very clearly. She remembered the hits on her broken body. She remembered fading into nothing. Alex slapped a hand of her mouth as the sweet air escaped her with the sounds of a sudden, almost sob. Was this it? Was her time over? The others probably won't ever find out what happened to her, and her last actions on Earth were aiding and abetting the rise of ultimate darkness from it's cosmic cage.

Way to go, idiot! she thought to herself, as tears began to form in the corners of her closed, clenched eyes. You were given a second chance at life and were even given superpowers...and this is how you used it!

Her eyes popped open as a final, devastating thought crashed through her mind.

Ben

She had left him to his fate. He was only twelve years old and she had left him in the hands of a guy who was essentially working for the devil. Alex dropped to her knees and held her head in her hands. Then she cried.

Alex cried for Ben, who had only wanted his imaginary friend to be real. She cried for the Guardians, who were now left to clean up the mess that she had only made worse. She cried for the people of Earth who were now going to pay for her actions, and she cried for Prometheus who, despite being an evil douche canoe, truly believed he was going to get back home. Then she cried for herself, lost and completely alone.

Tears and throat-ripping sobs escaped her for hours, for days, or maybe it was only for a few minutes. She couldn't tell how long had passed as she sat in that same patch of flattened grass she awoke in, in this place where time seemed to have flipped the bird and exited stage left. All Alex knows was that she cried and continued to cry...until she heard a voice.

Over her own sobs and gasps and stuffed nose, she heard humming. Alex took a few shuddering breaths as she tried to calm herself and listen. The voice was deep, soft, and distant. It came from very far off. The sound of the song warbled as it echoed across the field. The wind stilled for a second before kicking back up again. The grass whirled and danced in rhythm with the haunting voice and the wind itself whirled around her. It pushed at her back and pulled at her clothes. Alex hauled herself to her feet and looked around. There was nothing for miles but the tall grass ahead and behind her, and the trees on her left and right. But the wind continued to push and pull. It whispered in her ear.

Walk

So she did. With one hand she wiped the remaining tears from her cheeks and the other wrapped tight around the leather band of her satchel that was always strapped across her chest. She moved her right foot, then her left, and she knew it had to be her that was moving, she could feel her legs pushing against the ground, but... The world around her seemed to move instead. As if by walking she pulled at the very fabric of space and pushed it behind her, like some kind of cosmic treadmill. The movement sped up, the trees and grass whipped by her at blurring speeds but she couldn't really feel it. Just the movement of her legs, right then left, as she moved toward the voice. The song wasn't getting any louder, but she knew she was getting closer.

Alex walked and continued to walk until finally, she stopped, the world stopped, and a man appeared before her. He sat, legs crossed, on top of a large gray boulder beneath the shade of a tree that definitely belonged in the African savanna rather than the forests of southern China. The man himself was tall and wide. He wore soft, loose green pants held together at his waist with a bright red sash. A white, woolen burnouse draped over his shoulders and wrapped around his chest loosely. The hood it attached to was wide and completely covered the back of his head. The man continued to hum with a voice that echoed deep and soothing all around her. It seemed the grass and trees had become perfect sounding boards. He did not move as she approached and his voice did not falter.

The song dipped and crooned. It told a story, despite the absence of lyrics, of a journey, a fight, and an oncoming storm. It was a war chant. It was a lullaby. Alex took another step closer as the song began anew. The notes sounded familiar to her, she knew them enough that perhaps she could even hum along. She took another step forward but quickly froze at a rustling in the grass near the man's feet. At the base of the boulder, lay a lion.

Well, she guessed it was a lion.

It was lion-like and had a thick mane that encircled it's face... but it was HUGE. The beast was so enormous that the lion's back, despite the creature laying flattened in the grass, reached the soles of the man's feet were the lay crossed at the top of the boulder. It was twice the size of an adult horse and looked like it would have no problem taking down a herd of elephants on its own. Its fur was coarse, coppery red, and there seemed to be faint stripes and spots mixed into it. Instead of one tail, it had three, all long and curling through the grass like vipers. Two, ivory white horns rose out of the crown of its head, right at the point where its mane began. They were like two twisted spires and reminded Alex of horns she had seen on African Kudus. But what had really intrigued her about this creature were the great pair of wings folded up close to its back. They were feathered in browns and golds and she imaged if the were to be spread out they would be longer than a city bus.

The grass made no noise beneath her feet but the lion opened a single eye, the size of her hand, and put a single, ferocious, slit pupil on her. The beast stared at her from where she stood but made no move to attack. Alex couldn't help but stare back at the predator's gaze, frozen on the spot.

"Come closer, child." the man's voice rumbled, cutting of his song.

Alex made no move, and neither did the beast at the man's feet. The man seemed to realize she was weary of the lion and turned slightly, enough to address her from over his beefy shoulder.

"You have no reason to fear. Sekh will not harm you."

Alex watched the beast's...Sekh's chest move up and out with each breath it took. She could hear the air whistling through its great nose. She suddenly thought that maybe this was a dream after all, one she received from being knocked out. A big, beautiful beast like this, watching her but with the laziest body language she had seen only in house cats, had to be something only her imagination could make up. So with that, she took a step forward.

"Unless, of course, you give her a reason to."

The beast quickly sat up as if it were preparing to pounce and Alex came to a halt. The fight or flight instinct suddenly coursed through her blood as she made an impressive impersonation of a statue. Before she could decide to risk seeing if the beast could fly faster than herself, the man laughed.

"I only jest. Come closer, Alexandra. We have much to discuss." he smiled as he ran a large hand through the beast's thick mane

"You know my name?" was the only thing she could think to say.

"Well, of course. I know you."

"You do?"

"Indeed. You know me as well."

She did. Somewhere, far in the back of her mind, she did know him. Vaguely, in the same way you recognize someone as a distant cousin when you finally get dragged to a family reunion. Of course, she had never met him before, but she did know him. Probably as much as he proclaimed to know her. Who was this man, 7 feet tall and 300 pounds of pure muscle, who sat here before her like he had been in the middle of a meditation session? Who was this man, who seemed to be the only other person in this...whatever this place was? Who was this man, who somehow had tamed a gigantic lion beast of legend? This man held a content smile, knowing and faintly amused. The dark skin visible on his arms were littered with scars from countless battles from long ago. This man was wise from years of experience and, despite only looking in his early fourties, was very old. She could read it in his eyes, gold as coins and so very much like her own. This man was ancient.

This was Mahrem.

"You're... Mahrem." she repeated aloud.

His smile widened and he turned fully on the rock to face her. The man named Mahrem placed his hands on his knees and bent forward to see her better.

"And you are Alexandra-...No no, just Alex. Storyteller, legend seeker,...adventurer extraordinaire!" he clapped his hands together twice with a loud chuckle. "I used to be a bit of an adventurer myself. Always getting myself into trouble, and I've had my fair share of travels. Ah, the tales I could tell. Quest after quest, it was never enough!"

He huffed and leaned back, suddenly lost in thought.

"That, of course, was before such responsibility was bestowed upon me." He waved her closer. As the beast finally relaxed and closed its eyes, she complied. "Something else we seem to share."

"I'm super confused." Alex admitted.

"Oh, I am sure you are. But you will find a way to make it through, of that I have no doubt."

"Okay, not really helping, but I guess that's kind of expected given the situation." she mumbled to herself before speaking louder. "Where am I?"

"Exactly where you were."

"Umm.."

" I understand that does not make much sense at the moment, but all will become clear as we continue to speak. For right now, I'd like to tell you a story. One I believe is long overdue."

Alex was starting to think that this was definitely a dream as none of this made sense. She crossed her arms and sighed through her nose. She was sure she had something she needed to be doing right now but, this place, whatever it was, seemed to be clouding her thoughts. She had began to notice that there seemed to be some kind of disconnect between her mind and body. Alex could feel her feet on the ground beneath her, the way the grass swayed against her skin and clothes, but it was like she was perceiving them through a heavy filter.

Dream. her mind reminded.

She looked off in the distance, but could only see the never ending field and the trees that bordered it on either side. She knew she wasn't getting out of here anytime fast, at least not without help. So, she did what she usually did anytime she was faced with something she had never met before. Alex pulled her bag from her back and retrieved her old, worn journal and a pencil. She dropped herself into the grass before the boulder Mahrem was perched on top of and nodded for him to begin.

Parad Cali was a lucky planet; created in just the right way and just the right place. Its position between various, populated planets allowed it to become a hub of commerce for the star system. It was a center for art, music, and scientific advancement. Children born on Parad Cali were raised with the languages and educations of multiple life forms and cultures. Never had there been any shortages of resources with numerous trade routes between planets. There had always been peace.

The universe is big, you see. Almost infinitely so. The Iter Federation, with its home base on Parad Cali, were always eager to know what lay just beyond our borders of explored space. A team, myself along with eleven others, were stationed to the farthest branch of mapped space recorded. We were housed in a moderate space ship, the Nibirus, at the edge of a large nebula. The Federation had yet to travel through the dense cloud of star dust and it was our duty to determine what, if anything, laid on the other side and if anything could get through safely. You see, what kept us from simply flying through was a rather large asteroid belt hidden under the gas. We spent years on that ship, sending probe after probe into the unknown. Most we lost contact with and assume were destroyed by space debris, but those that were not immediately demolished within days of deployment only told us that the size of the belt was wider than we assumed. With each signal we received, it's size grew wider and the margins of sending a ship through safely slimmed. After years, with no breakthrough, the Federation had decided it was time we returned. We were instructed to turn our ship back and return planet side within a matter of days. If an un-maned small probe could not make it past the minefield of asteroids that lurked in the dark, they would not risk sending a crew through. Too much money was being wasted on such a useless venture. No one would ever get through the Nebula.

Until, one day, someone did.

Not hours before we would be setting a course back for Parad Cali, a heavily damaged ship, small and made for a single pilot, glided silently out of the nebula. We locked onto its distress signal the moment it was clear of the cloud. The signal had been sent out on an automatic system as the pilot, we discovered once we were able to bring the ship on board, had not survived the trip. The pilot had not been a life form we had any knowledge of. Despite the grim circumstances, we were elated; thrilled. There was something on the other side of the nebula. There was life! My team quickly contacted our base as we rummaged through the remains of the ship. The technology was nothing like we had ever seen. Even for us, a race of beings able to travel through the stars at hyperspeed, the technology of the ship was far more advanced than anything we had developed. We searched through the ship, pulling out strange equipment and tools until, right beneath the pilot's seat we found a box. It must have been similar to our own black boxes because the moment we touched it, it came to life. The surface lit up like a screen and we were able to see the pilot, alive and speaking very frantically to someone. We could not understand his language and thought, for a brief moment, his message might go unheard. As our Captain wrapped his hands around the edges of the box, the technology must have recognized we did not understand and began translating in our native tongue. The pilot, whose voice was now repeating in a recorded loop was not speaking to anyone else, he had been leaving a message.

"...pray that whoever finds this moves quickly. It is coming! I-it has already taken our star!... This message goes out to any higher life form a-able to receive this broadcast. The beast is coming! It devours everything in its path! W-we know not where it came from. Perhaps from creation... the universe itself... You must be advised,...t-tell whoever is in command! You must evacuate immediately! ...Ranamorr will be the end of all."

Message Repeats

We did not know what to make of the poor soul's cries. He had sacrificed his own life in order to deliver his message. It was agreed we would warn the Iter Federation of what we learned and would bring the ship and its long dead passenger to the first station we reached.

We never even made it to the communications center.

Black, darker than the void of space itself, streamed out of the Nebula faster than anything without a hyperdrive would be able to. It swarmed around us endlessly, so large our sensors could not pick up anything other than the black itself. The entire ship shook with the rough contact. We all thought our doom had come. But just as quickly as it arrived, it left. It flew right past us as if we were nothing more than a chunk of space debris. Was this the thing the pilot had died trying to save us from?

As the black, we had no other knowledge of the creature besides it's awful darkness, disappeared out of visual range, we realized we had been left alive. Our lives had been spared. But what could that message have meant? What was that creature, and what had it been looking for?

It turns out life, had been what it was looking for. We had been spared because we were so small in number, so unimportant and vastly worthless compared to a much larger prize. As our ship began making its way home, we realized that thing had been eating away at life, any collection of life in large numbers. Coordinates where a large station had once been anchored were nothing more than empty space. It had completely swallowed up everything in its path. Nothing remained.

We began to pick up communications, from multiple stations, of the creature tearing through whole planets and picking up speed. It moved too fast for anything to follow. Those on planets would be calling out one second, screaming for rescue, and in the next second ...silence... There were reports of it growing in size and power with each gluttonous swallow. It seemed to be leaving smaller ships, research vessels like our own, out of its diet. So, as it moved towards our home and our families, an evacuation attempt was made.

It was put to a vote whether we would hyper jump across space to Parad Cali, without authorization and a clear path. You must understand, this was something that would normally have us sentenced to prison for life. Without someone giving us a proper go ahead to jump, we had no way of knowing if our destination point would be clear. A second ship could be leaving the planet, in the exact spot we would arrive in, and...well, no one was sure what would happen as there were laws and procedures to prevent it, but it was safe to assume nothing good could happen if suddenly there were two things occupying a space where there had only been one.

It was because of these possibilities, the fear of the unknown, we hesitated. We could not get in contact with anyone in the Iter Federation stationed at Parad Cali as a planet wide evacuation was in process. We could not make a decision. We were terrified.

Alex's pencil paused on the yellowed paper of her journal as she was met with a heavy silence. She glanced up at Mahrem. He had cast his gaze up towards the sky somewhere in the middle of his story, but his eyes were unfocused and glazed. He was clearly lost in thought, and she didn't want to seem rude by calling him out. She bit her lip for a second, waiting to see if he would come back to himself.

"So," she spoke when the anticipation finally became to much for her. "What...what did you-"

Mahrem suddenly realized he had stopped in the middle of his recollection.

"I apologize," he started. "Some memories become stronger, it seems, when you speak them aloud."

"I'm sorry. If you want-"

"No, it is quite alright. This is something you must know."

He unfolded his legs from beneath him and let them dangle over the edge of the boulder. He was tall enough that, despite the boulder being bigger than her, his feet skimmed over the tips of the tall grass.

"What did you do?" she asked quietly.

"We jumped."

He lifted his gaze back to the sky as he began where he left off.

"That, of course, was our biggest mistake. By the time we had finally come to a decision, it was too late. Parad Cali had been over taken by the darkness just as we had strapped in for the jump. We were aware of this, of course. We were aware that we were too late because of our hesitation...because of our fear of the unknown, but we ignorantly clung to the hope that there was still something we could do. So we jumped without clearance."

"And Parad Cali?"

"Gone. The space our home had occupied for countless eons had been replaced completely by the beast."

"I-...i'm sorry. I can't even begin to imagine what it would be like to see that."

"Neither can I." he admitted. "We were never able to see if anything had been left over from the Darkness' hunger."

"But I thought you jumped."

"We did."

In our haste to get home, we did not consider the size that Ranamorr, for that was what the alien pilot had called it, had grown to. As we exited hyperspace, we had hoped to land in empty space some ways out from our planet, but the creature had grown with each planet and station it swallowed. Some part of it must have been in the same spot we landed in.

There was a big flash of light, so bright it had a physical presence that pressed down on us from within the Nibirus, and a noise unlike anything we had ever heard before. A roar, perhaps, from the darkness itself? We were not too concerned with where the sound had originated from as at that exact moment we felt our blood turn to fire in our veins. We were being torn apart, molecule by molecule and we could feel the universe falling away from beneath us. Whatever had happened in our exit from hyperspace was now ripping us away from the very fabric of reality. We were being tossed who knows where, our bodies being remade. The light still burned bright all around us. It remade us and shoved itself into our very beings. When everything had finally stopped, when the light had faded and the roar of that...that beast...had been replaced with silence, we opened our eyes.

We were still in our ship, strapped in as if nothing had happened. Our ship had been damaged in the attempt to get to our destination. We were floating off with no control, afraid we might impact with a rescue ship or some form of debris leftover from the destruction. We glanced out our window panels, expecting to see that we were spiraling towards certain doom but...we were not. Instead of hovering around the empty space of what used to be Parad Cali, we were drifting next to a planet. Several planets, all tinier than they should have been. We were drifting in a sea of toy sized planets and stars! The damage sustained to our ship had destroyed parts of the hull, but we were completely fine. We could breathe.

It seemed that wherever we were, the rules of reality did not work the same way we were used to. We inhaled non existent air and the need for food and water had become a faint memory. We spent years drifting in that place and in that time, we learned a lot. We discovered we no longer aged. We were stronger than before and we had... gifts. That light, whatever it had been, flowed through our bodies and changed us. We had become, not comrades gained through war, but a family, siblings bonded through the energy swimming in our blood. The light danced inside us and revealed unimaginable power. With time, we were able to control it.

Eventually, it was discovered that we had been shoved into a hidden space...a pocket dimension. One that still connected back to our own. We spent much of our time looking for an exit, a door that would lead us back to our own reality. But there was nothing we could find, nothing out there for us to leave through. We were trapped in a bubble of sub-space, outside of our own universe. It then occurred to us that if we had been shoved in there by that strange light, then surely we could leave it same way. If we could not find a door, then we would make one for ourselves, a way for us to escape the prison we had been trapped in.

Using parts of our ship, relics of the Nibirus... from an empire destroyed by a single creature, a gateway was created. With our own hands, we had ripped a hole between universes. Whatever had happened to us during that explosion had given us so much...power. We were like gods! And like gods, we were vengeful. With our newfound gifts, we could destroy Ranamorr and avenge the destruction of our home. We had the power to make sure no one else had to suffer like we did.

With this wish in our hearts, we crossed through the gateway and found ourselves above a significantly smaller planet than we expected. It was not our home, or any planet that we had knowledge of. We were not back where we had come from. The gateway had sent us, not where we wanted, but to the place we needed to be. Ranamorr had fallen to this planet, desperate for food. In the event that trapped us in a separate universe, Ranamorr had been sapped of his strength and size. If we were going to destroy the beast, now would be the time to do it.

We dropped to the planet below and fought the beast with every ounce of power that had been gifted to us. We fought and fought, but the beast was relentless. Even in its weakened form, we could not defeat it. We would never be able to avenge the trillions of lives lost. But...we could leave. The planet was small, no where near the size of Parad Cali or any off the planets under the Iter Federation. Ranamorr would never be able to gain enough power to flee back to the stars. We could simply leave the beast here and return to our own galaxy. We could help rebuild from whatever had been left of the survivors. We could forget about the beast and make ourselves a new home...but we did not. The creatures of this world were so tiny and small. They had barely learned to stand up right, but given time, they could have been something great. Could we simply abandon these creatures, abandon this world, just to be rid of that horrendous evil?

No...we could not.

It was decided, unanimously and without hesitation, that we would protect this world. We threw the beast through a new gateway and trapped it in the very prison we had discovered the light flowing through us. We sealed the gateway and hid the keys out of reach. And though the beast would try, countless times, to rip through the prison back into our universe, we would never allow it to succeed. We vowed to hold the seal, to protect all life from the beast, so that no one would ever have to face what we did.

"Wait...you sealed Ranamorr? On Earth?"

"We did."

"Like...Earth-Earth."

"I am not aware of another planet with the same name."

Alex mulled over the facts she had just been handed. If he and his friends were the ones that fought that thing and sealed it away in the Pit...then that meant that Mahrem was...

"You're one of the twelve."

He nodded with a smile. He pulled his legs back on top of the boulder and stood to his full height. He towered over the girl before him in a stance that reminded Alex of the statues carved for the Greek gods. The man quickly jumped down from his pedestal and stood before her with the posture of a king.

"My name is Mahrem Asht'ovi and I am one of the First Twelve."

"...your brother has really been a pain..." she whispered, still processing what he was admitting. It suddenly occurred to her that he was here, standing before her and not where he should have been. "I thought Prometheus killed you!...and the others. He said he sucked the life out of you and into his magic wand."

"This is what I thought as well. But it seems that the event that started all of this, so long ago, changed us more than we realized. It is true my physical form faded away that night on the mountain, but the light...my being...it did not need a house of flesh to live. It is pure energy, and lives all on its own."

"So you're alive?"

"Indeed," Mahrem confirmed. "As are the others...Prometheus needs our energy to power the Relics in order to open the gateway."

"Trust me, I know all about that. Prometheus was quick to monologue his entire evil plan right before he kicked my ass." Alex paused with a sudden realization. "Wait, if I'm here, does that mean I'm..in the scepter?"

While Mahrem seemed to be cool with it, the thought of having her body destroyed and her soul sucked out, like a vacuum hose to soup, was not giving her a happy feeling.

"Worry not, Alex." he said placing his large hands on both of her shoulders. Despite him not having a physical body, Alex shook from the weight of his presence. Not from his hands on her, but from something else...something deeper. It was as if their...souls? energies?... connected at the point of contact on her shoulders. Alex wasn't sure what that meant but she didn't really have the vocabulary to describe the feeling. "Prometheus did not destroy your physical form. You still lay unconscious on the Fairy Bridge."

"So this is a dream." she mumbled darkly.

"This encounter is very much real. You have entered an inbetween space, similar to the pocket universe myself and the others were trapped in." He glanced around the area as if he were just seeing it for the first time. "Though this one seems much smaller and localized to the bridge you are on. There must be ley lines that cross in the area."

"But...wait a minute," she said pushing his hands off her and the feeling of the connection vanished. "If this is real, how come I can see you? How am I even talking to you?"

"The same way you were able to come to this place. When we opened the gateway on Earth there was-"

"An explosion of power that rippled through the planetary ley lines...blah, blah, blah, Bermuda Triangle. Prometheus gave me the spiel before he knocked me out. And I get that, trust me, I do...but how was I able to get in here? Weren't these places created from your power? They don't just open up and eat people. It would be a lot more obvious that these places existed if they're just sitting at every intersection of ley lines. People would be disappearing right off the street."

Mahrem chuckled and nodded as he could see the confusion from her point of view.

"Thankfully they do not work that way," he explained. "Usually the intersections absorb large amounts of energy, like your planes and boats. But for a single person to simply cross into one, they would need an energy much more powerful...One that matched the intersection's own."

Alex lowered her head and began to process all the information being thrown her way. She wanted to understand. How was she here? How did her energy even come close to matching a...a gateway, as Mahrem had called it. Alex's eyes widened and something in her brain clicked. All that talk Prometheus had shouted at her when he had been strangling her in the mountain. All that talk of shadows, of replacements. What...what was she? Mahrem could see the frustration in her eyes growing and decided to lend her a small mercy. He grabbed her right hand and placed it in his left. His own right hand hovered above her's, inches from her palm.

"It is cosmic energy that created the intersections, just as it created me,...and as it created you. We are able to be in this place, outside of space and time itself, because we are connected through that energy. There is a bond between us now, one that was formed the second you were born again."

The skin of her arm lit up with that familiar, golden light. Against her will, as if it had a mind of its own, it flowed down the muscles in her arm and pooled in her palm. The energy seeped from her skin, like it had done so many times before, and danced between their hands. It moved like a flame would and seemed to hold the stars themselves inside it. She had a sudden flashback, what felt like months but had only been about a week ago, to when she and Jack had stood like this. Her energy just barely grazing the skin of his hand. But unlike that day in Mongolia, the day that seemed to have started everything for her, the energy did not just simply dance there. It began to move in a tighter dance. It swirled faster and faster in the palm of her hand until finally, it began to spiral upwards. Up and up it spiraled until it hit Mahrem's hand...and then it seeped into his own skin. She had never seen that happen before. Even when she had laid a glowing hand on Ben to get him to do something he normally was too afraid to... It entered his palm and traveled up the muscles in his own arm until the light disappeared from view beneath his white burnouse.

"As we began to make a home here on this new planet, we began to watch over the beings who stood out from the other creatures of this planet. Over time, we became fascinated with them. We wanted them to succeed...to build a civilization in which they could thrive. These...humans, who reminded us so much of ourselves, were forced to brave a world in which Ranamorr had influence. Things that should not have been...shadows...they lurked around every corner and would hunt the humans to extinction if given the chance. There was an imbalance."

Mahrem pulled his hand away from hers, but the connection of energy followed him, even as he took a step back. It flowed from her hand to his, as if they were bound by a braided rope made up of pure light.

"We each began to use our gifts to help them, not only survive, but thrive. We transferred our energy to them, in a form that would allow them to solve the problems they needed to overcome. We did not appear from the heavens and throw bolts of lightning at their enemies. We were much more subtle than that."

He began to move his hand, commanding the energy to dance around them in silent, drifting swirls. He moved it more effortlessly than she could, and it seemed to listen to him better than it had ever listened to her. The golden energy Alex had associated for so long as hers now seemed to be theirs.

"We took it upon ourselves to give the humans inspirations, ideas, ...virtues they could use to build their societies with. Ganesha favored knowledge. Ma'at favored justice. Pachamama brought a willingness for change. Hunahpu encouraged the camaraderie of allies and Samuel was dedicated to the idea of freedom for all. Eventually our energies conformed to our own beliefs. Where once we were all a uniform color, our energies changed hues. Green for fortune, pink for compassion and blue for curiosity. Red for perseverance and silver for creativity. Providence became the white of a full moon."

"And you?" Alex heard herself say when she had finally found her voice.

Mahrem smiled down at her. He walked back to stand in front of her and placed his hand to hover above her own as if he had never moved.

"We became what we are because we feared the unknown. We were scared of what could happen...and we hesitated. Perhaps we could have saved-...well it matters not what could have happened. It only matters what did. Despite the fear we all felt, the horror of what could happen to us, we still did what we thought was right... And that was something I wanted to share with this new world."

He placed his hand completely over hers now. He clasped their hands together as if they were shaking them and meeting for the first time. The second their palms made contact, the light beneath her skin grew ten times bright. A wave of warmth flashed over her entire body...and suddenly she understood what he meant. She knew.

"Those who do what they must even in the face of unknown terror will always have me by their side. For every sound that goes bump in the night, I am the golden light that shields and protects. I am the energy that powers the brave to do what is right, and I am the spark of fire that wrestles fear. I-" He paused and then motioned down at their conjoined hands. "We... are courage."

She could feel it. The knowledge of who she was and what she could do flowed through her. It was as if knowing had suddenly unlocked more power than she had ever known. No longer did she outright fear facing Prometheus and his stupid, glowy stick of death. It no longer mattered that she was afraid of the idea of having to face Ranamorr. She had something to fight for, and she would do whatever it takes to protect it. Alex was...powerful.

"Hold to that feeling rising inside of you. You will need it very soon. Prometheus now has all twelve Relics and your friends will need your help in stopping him."

"Right."

"But please, know this..." Mahrem hesitated for a second, trying to find the right words to ask her...no, plead with her. "Prometheus is the one who has brought this upon us again, that much is true, but know that his mind has been poisoned by the beast. It has warped his memories and has dug its claws in deep. He truly believes that he is helping us return home. That Ranamorr will simply allow us to leave and that he will fade away to some distant star. But our home is no more...it has been for some time."

"Just, one last question," Alex started while gesturing down at their hands. "How did this happen? How did I get this energy if you were trapped in the scepter?"

"You cannot trap an idea, Alex." Mahrem chuckled. "The night Prometheus attacked me on the mountain, I was over powered; weak in comparison. I had allowed my fear to overtake me. As Prometheus absorbed my energy into his scepter, I asked the only other sibling I had left for help."

"The Man in the Moon?"

"Correct. If Ranamorr were to truly rise again. If Prometheus was too far gone to stop himself...then the world would need the courage to stand against the darkness. Lunar did not make you as a copy of me. He chose you, because you proved to him that you were willing to do what was right, even in the face of fear. You are not a replacement, nor a shadow of the First Twelve. Lunar simply opened you to potential energy...and you latched on as if it had always been yours."

"I don't think I've done anything to prove I deserve this." Alex whispered in denial. Fear was creeping back in. She gripped Mahrem's hand tighter, as if he would shake her off at any second. "I don't know if I can fight Prometheus again. And how am I supposed to beat Ranamorr if I can't even stop your brother?"

"Do not be foolish. Look at all you have accomplished! Look at you, right now. You are here, despite being afraid of someone stronger than you, despite what your friends might say, or what might happen after all this is over,...you did what you had to do to save the life of a single child. You faced off against an ancient being to get your friend back. And you will do it again, because you have to. Do not doubt yourself for one second, Alexandra. For when the Moon looked at you, he saw great courage."

Just as the sun was beginning to set, Alex snapped back into herself. She lay in the same place she had fallen in the middle of the land bridge. She pulled herself onto her knees and scanned the area around her. The trees were the right size and the colors of the grass were much more muted now. Just like they were supposed to be. Faintly, she became aware of the sounds of rushing water from the river beneath the land bridge. The sky darkened as time finally moved forward. She was back. Alex stood to her full height. She had no injuries on her, and the ground around her was undisturbed. It was like the battle with Prometheus had never happened.

That suited her just fine, she decided. If she was going to be given a second chance to fight Prometheus, she'd want to do it at her best. She clenched her hands and in that single moment, the energy beneath her skin fired to life. A rush of power flowed over her and threatened to take her breath away. Alex pushed herself away the ground, much easier than she ever had before, and rose high into the air. Once she reached a good height, her head snapped to the east. In the back of her mind she could feel something signalling her, like a beacon that shined far brighter than any star. Someone was calling out for help. Someone needed her, and she was all to eager to race towards them. The corners of her lips upturned in a light smile. This was who she was, who she had always meant to be. It didn't matter how scared she was going into battle again, ...not really. She could feel it, the energy coursing through her veins, as it became more a part of her being than it had before.

She was powerful.

So I went ahead and edited this chapter in preparation for the next one. My computer sucks and the chapter I had for chapter 20 disappeared into the aether along with a lot of the previous chapters... Oh well!

-M.F.A.L.A