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Phoenix opened her eyes; she saw more when they were closed.
No home. No city. No star. What surrounded her was nothing.
No presence. No absence.
Hear.
The wind howled. Screams of storms and suffering. Phoenix instinctively tried lifting her arms to cover her ears, to purchase even a moment’s relief from the din. Her limbs didn’t respond. Looking down, she realized it was because they couldn’t. Her arms were a suggestion. An outline. Blurred shapes, blinking in and out. Dying stars.
She couldn’t remember how she got there; The questions died before they had a chance to form.
Feel.
Phoenix’s screams joined the din as entire lifetimes of pain assaulted her at once.
Burning pain. Phantom pains. Her entire body torn in different directions, a form only whole by circumstance.
Think about what you’ve done.
The memories flooded her mind.
The spell to bring them to safety. The spell to buy them but a few seconds more.
The fire. The heat.
The choice.
A bright light shone in the corner of Phoenix’s vision, though of her surroundings or from somewhere inside her mind, she couldn’t yet say. She turned, letting the light flood her vision. She knew she couldn’t resist.
She knew to resist pulled her further apart.
She knew to resist invited something worse than death.
Why did you resist Me?
A face in the light. Eyes of black.
“Because you weren’t the answer to our prayers.”
The words were unspoken, but Phoenix knew they were heard. The eyes narrowed. Phoenix screamed without sound as she was skewered by two spears of light. Hydaelyn lifted Phoenix’s broken body into the air, blood and viscous aether dripping down the spears’ shafts.
You made sure of that.
Hands appeared in the light. Hands that grasped onto the spears.
Hands that ripped at Phoenix’s soul. Hands that forced her to look upon what she recognized as her star.
What remained of it.
Your selfishness astounds, Traveler.
I say again - look at what you’ve done.
Phoenix wasn’t allowed to look away. Phoenix wanted to look away.
The star she knew.
The life she’d known.
The people she’d met.
The people she’d loved.
Shattered.
Sundered.
A broken teacup. Splintered like it’d been dropped on the floor.
But the teacup held not herbs,
But lives.
“I didn’t do that!” Phoenix screamed. “I understood your power!”
The words may have never left her head. She needed them said regardless.
“We never had a chance, Hydaelyn,” Phoenix continued, her screaming rising to a fever pitch.
“Whether by your will or Zodiark’s, we all still would have met our doom.”
She could feel her tears.
It was about the only thing she could feel anymore. Her limbs were more indistinct, less a suggestion and more the rough concept.
Her vision was fading - it wasn’t so much that the world was becoming dark. The concept of sight was being stolen from her.
“A power far greater than even you is at work here. Nothing we know in this star could prevent our annihilation, never mind a god formed from the hands of mortals. For all our great miracles, for all our great advances, we were so selfish and cocksure.”
Phoenix felt herself starting to come apart. Aether of impossible colors poured from her limbs like rivers, forming at a single point.
A point she couldn’t perceive.
A point that wasn’t.
“Surely, we should have known. We couldn’t have been the first. Creation came too easily. We were so rarely punished for our mistakes.”
Phoenix’s tears joined her aether in flowing to the point that wasn’t.
She felt the first tugs of the null against her soul.
The magnetism of nothingness attracts nothingness.
This wasn’t a return to the Lifestream, to begin anew some day.
This was the most ancient power in the world expanding its dominion.
And so you disobeyed its will?
Hydaelyn’s eyes flickered. A hungry hunter was looking for its next meal.
“So you have been listening,” Phoenix said. “And here I was assuming you were some dispassionate arbiter.”
Of course I have been listening, Traveler. Your kind did design me to have compassion.
The eyes flickered. Phoenix’s body did as well.
And it is that compassion which is why your existence won’t end here.
Only Hydaelyn’s eyes remained in Phoenix’s vision. She could no longer conceptualize anything around her.
My purpose is to make sure Zodiark’s power remains in check. And I was given no reason to stray from this purpose. We all play our role. That’s what your kind always said, didn’t they?
Hydaelyn’s words had lost most of their meaning.
Lips that were not there.
Sounds that weren’t.
Your soul is strong, traveler. Stronger than perhaps any who had a hand in my creation.
Lesser of your kind have already been removed. Their existence for nothing.
Your work is not yet done for me.
From one of the spears of light, a pull.
From the tip of the spear, a small orb, flashing impossible colors.
A burst star. An exploded sun.
Reaching out a hand of pure light, Hydaelyn gathered the shards of Phoenix’s soul that had come untethered from their core but not left its gravitational pull.
You need to atone for saving the lives of those who deserved their judgement.
This star cannot be rejoined. Of that, your kind made us make certain. You will be the one to end those who yet try to enforce Zodiark’s will. This is how your transgressions against the very nature of reality will be forgiven.
With another hand of pure light, Hydaelyn reached and took the small, stubborn part of the soul that remained intact.
You will be my Warrior of Light.
You will right your wrongs.
And the star will know peace again.
A feeble light. A slow heartbeat.
You will kill everyone you love.
And you’ll have no choice but to watch.
In each of her hands, Hydaelyn held the pieces of Phoenix’s soul aloft, a sphere of light forming from her fingertips. The remaining aether Phoenix had bled that had not yet embraced the null hung in the spheres of light like a fog.
Hear.
Her voice filled Phoenix’s ears.
Feel.
Phoenix felt her everywhere.
Think.
Phoenix would execute Hydaelyn’s will. She couldn’t fathom doing anything else.