Light Parting With the Night (SSoDI-N)

[ParamountKeymaster]

"Oh, piss on that!" Kelsey snapped irately. "I think I would've figured out by now if one of my friends was an angel in disguise! I have eyes inside their souls!"

"Eyes for days."

Kelsey snarled at the cat as it disappeared into the shadows again, her blood pressure rising with every sickeningly saccharine word the infernal creature said. "STOP... CALLING ME THAT! STOP FOLLOWING ME! I DON'T NEED YOUR HELP! LEAVE ME ALONE!!!"

Soon enough, it was just her and Tri again. Kelsey's eyes darted back and forth between the two paths in the tunnel. Between where Mara had disappeared and where Percy had disappeared. As the adrenaline kicked in, everything that had just gone down between the latter and her fell to the wayside. Her anger remained as fiery as ever, directed at a new source of frustration and enmity.

"F*CK IT!" She swiped the broken jar off the ground, then she promptly spread her wings, stirred up the wind, and charged deeper into the cave, back towards where everything had fallen apart.

"Whoa, WHOA, Kelsey, hold up a minute!" Tri darted after her, his expression somewhere between desperate and furious. "What have I been trying to tell you this whole time?! You don't have to do this!"

"And leave him to the devices of worse powers that be?!" Kelsey shouted back, flying on the breeze towards the light at the end of the tunnel. "I can't do that! I was stupid to just let him go on his own like that! YOU KNOW WHAT HIS SOUL REPRESENTS, TRI! WE CAN'T LOSE THAT!"

Tri groaned and covered his face with his hand, but nonetheless kept up with Kelsey as she propelled herself up through the hole in the ceiling that Percy had made. "You know damn well you're only setting yourself up for disappointment here!"

"I DON'T CARE! I'M NOT LETTING HIM THROW EVERYTHING AWAY! MAYBE HE'S SELFISH ENOUGH TO ABANDON THE PEOPLE WHO NEED HIM, BUT I'M NOT!!!"

Kelsey burst from the ground and into the light like a bat out of hell, wind and rubble scattering explosively in her wake. The world outside was familiar yet different, but she paid no mind to such details. All that she cared about as she soared above the barren landscape was finding the misguided hybrid teen before something significantly worse than either of them could.

"PERCY?! PERCY!!!"

She was foolish to let him go. Completely shortsighted. But if there was even the slightest chance that she could fix this mess she had helped create...

"PERCY, WHERE ARE YOU?! PERCYYYYY!!! PERC-eh-!"

...........................



"No, no, no no no no no no no no..." Kelsey's voice was hollow, barely audible, as she dropped down towards a body lying in the dry brown grass. Her landing was clumsy, legs tripping over themselves and sending her crashing onto her side, but her momentum remained constant as she instantly scrambled onto her hands and knees and crawled the last several feet, finally coming to a petrified halt next to Percy's still form.

"..........................."

For a while, Kelsey couldn't conjure any questions regarding the scene before her. How? Why? Who? What? None of it mattered. She couldn't even settle on a single emotion, never mind a thought. Heck, it took a good, long while for the fact that this even was Percy to sink in. The world was spinning too fast and the blood was gushing in her ears too loudly for her to immediately reach that conclusion, not that the utter devastation that awaited her at the end of that nauseating ride was any more comforting.

"I..."

Their conversation echoed in her brain. Distant, garbled, sentences overlapping each other, as if the tapes that stored her her memories were being played backwards and underwater. Her lungs ached as she heard herself yell at him. Her temples throbbed as she heard him yell at her. Over and over again, reminding her that Percy's last moments were spent in existential pain and lonesomeness. Reminding her of the job she had failed to do.

"You... STUPID... SELF-RIGHTEOUS... B*TCH!!!"

Finally, Kelsey dropped her head into her arms, curled inward, and let her upper body lean into the grass. Tears streamed from her eyes like a storm. Her fist repeatedly pounded the dirt. She couldn't look at Percy anymore. She couldn't look at the boy she had sent away to die alone.

"YOU SEE WHAT YOU DO?! YOU SEE WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU LET YOURSELF GET ATTACHED?! WHY DO YOU KEEP LETTING THIS HAPPEN?! THIS IS EXACTLY... WHAT... HE WAS TALKING ABOUT! IT DOESN'T MATTER WHETHER YOU LET THEM GO OR TRY TO PROTECT THEM! THEY'RE ALL JUST GONNA F*CKING DIE!!! BECAUSE OF YOU!!! SNFF...! GCKT-! AHGH-! GGGHGHHGGGHHHHGGGGHGHGHGGGRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!"

Shooting upright, lifting her head, Kelsey unleashed her deep, furious, wretched scream into the heavens. With it came a torrent of elements the likes of which only occurred at the death of a star. Blinding fire exploded from her form, turning everything a mile behind her into ash and dust. A cyclone swept through the cemetery, tearing it asunder in a matter of seconds. A stream of ice burst from her mouth, shooting into the sky and turning the grey clouds almost pitch black. Though this storm died down as quickly as it had been unleashed, her cries echoed through the empty city long, long after.

And as the deafening silence engulfed her again, snow drifting down from the overcast sky, Kelsey fell face-first into the grass again, every trace of her demonic power fading from her being as she wept silently and breathlessly for the latest person she had let down.

...........................

......................................................

.................................................................................

"I told you you were only gonna make it worse."

Her face thoroughly soaked, her cerulean eyes red and puffy, her nose dripping with snot, Kelsey craned her head up just enough to see Tri sitting next to her, staring down at Percy and slowly shaking his head in what seemed to be disappointment. "This is what I get for trying to prevent yet another emotional train wreck."

Kelsey sniffled as she stared up at her master, lost and confused, unable to respond. Then she shot back up onto her knees, teeth gritted as she shot Tri an accusatory scowl. "Did you know this was gonna happen?"

"..........................."

"ANSWER ME!!!"

"Maybe I did. So what?" Tri gave her a hard frown in return. "I did what needed to be done. For you and for the sake of the future we're spiraling towards."

Kelsey's jaw dropped in appalled disbelief. "You..."

"Oh, what, are you gonna give me the same spiel about keeping secrets?!" Tri snarled. "You think I'm no better than some snot-nosed brat who believes that he's too dangerous even for monsters?! Answer me this, Kelsey: What would you have done if you'd gotten here on time? We both know what would happen to you if you'd taken his soul."

"I could've saved him..."

"You say that like that's what he would've wanted."

"SHUT UP!!!" Kelsey wanted to stay angry, but the cracks in her voice wouldn't let her. "THIS DIDN'T HAVE TO HAPPEN! HE COULD'VE RISEN ABOVE THIS! HE COULD'VE BECOME EXACTLY WHAT I KNOW YOU'RE AFRAID OF HIM BECOMING! ALL THAT POTENTIAL... GONE!!! BECAUSE OF ME!!! BECAUSE OF US, TRI!!!"

Tri took a deep breath and let his expression and tone soften into something more sympathetic. He reach a hand out towards his partner. "Kelsey..."

"NO!!!" Kelsey instantly recoiled from him. "I DON'T WANT YOUR PITY! I DON'T WANT YOUR BULLSH*T EXCUSES! I DON'T WANT THE TROUBLE YOU CAUSE! JUST GO AWAY!!!!!"

Kelsey dropped down, propping herself up on her hands as she caught her breath and let yet more tears drip out. Her head was spinning again. Her blood was boiling. She was absolutely pissed off at everyone and everything, none more so than herself. She tensed up inside as she awaited whatever ludicrous thing Tri was prepared to say, but nothing ever came. When she looked up, she realized he was gone.

"Snff..."

She lowered her head again and lost herself in her sobs again. She didn't know what else to do. She didn't know where she was going to go from here. She didn't know how she was going to show her face to her friends again.

Her hand blindly searched the grass until it rested atop Percy's.

"I'm sorry..."

[DanteMGalileo]

Darkness...

Darkness lingered behind his eyes. He heard the wind grow silent. He barely felt his body slam onto the ground. So... this is what death felt like? It... it was quicker and easier than falling asleep. Maybe, just maybe... he'd find peace, answers. Maybe he'd see the parents he never got to know. Maybe... maybe everyone would be better off without him.

But then, he felt something. He caught sight of his own corpse out of his peripheral vision. He was above his body! Was this a part of dying? If so... where would he go next? Would it be off to hell with him? Would he be turned into a thorny tree to be forever torn apart by harpies? Would he end up waiting at the foot of a mountain for another lifetime? All he was sure of was that certainly, any good afterlife would be denied to him...

...

The body felt a pulse. It heard, at first, muffled words. It felt a hand on his. He became acutely aware of the ground, and the aching pain in his back. Across the body, the visible gashes began healing over, skin swarming over the wounds like water. From behind the empty eyelid, a faint red light glowed.

From below the bloodstains on his face, the blue marking writhed and twisted, turning red, reforming into a mark identical to the other. On his body, a series of red markings appeared, emitting a glow before fading back away.

Blood was flowing. His mind was working. He felt his lungs take in air. He heard her words, loud and clear.

Slowly, his eyes opened. Behind the empty socket was a glowing red orb, devoid of features and flickering like fire in the darkness. The other, intact eye was no longer purple, its pupils no longer diamond-shaped.

A bright red iris, with a narrow, snake-like pupil.

Slowly, groaning, Imago pulled his upper body upright, taking in the world he was in. Some kind of catastrophe had struck. The graves were leveled. There were no birds, or bugs, just the wind, and the other living creature in this dead, dead world.

"So..." Imago exhaled. There was no sign of Percy's voice with his. "This was where you chose to die." His words were not directed at Kelsey, but he did clearly intend for her to hear him. "Or rather... where you lost your soul to an invisible monster..."

[ParamountKeymaster]

"...!" Kelsey's head snapped up the moment a voice hit her eardrums, discovering that the body had been healed and was sitting up slightly. A startling revelation, sure, but one that provided more relief than confusion. She hastily wiped her face off, hoping to make herself look at least a little less pathetic.

"P..." It didn't take Kelsey considerably long to realize who she was dealing with. The voice, the tone, the markings, the general aura... they were all at odds with the young man she had just told off mere moments ago. "I-Imago..." Though this wasn't what she had expected, she didn't have it in her to be upset. It was better than nothing. "W-What happened...??"

[DanteMGalileo]

"... Your name is Kelsey, is it not?" Imago looked around, clearly not familiar with the world they were currently in. "Yes... I am Imago." There was a series of cracking sounds as the demon rose to his feet, rubbing his sore back. "Confound it all. Clearly, this body may be young, but I most certainly am not."

This girl- Kelsey... she asked him what happened. Imago rubbed his sore head. Gods. He hated being made of these materials, especially if this was going to be his permanent form from now on. "Your eyes are red. I'm going to assume you saw the landlord's body, lying dead." He grasped his wrist, as if examining all the features of this body. "... The landlord's soul is not dead. Rather, something, or somebody, left him for dead and stole his soul. With no second soul in this body, I assumed full control..."

Imago's hand molded into a three-clawed paw, prompting the demon to whistle, before turning it back into a human hand. "Do you know of this not-so-charming locale? And why... why are we here?"

[ParamountKeymaster]

"Yeah... Kelsey..." she mumbled in confirmation, sitting in the grass as she allowed herself a moment to calm down. She still felt distraught by the events that had transpired, especially since Imago's presence alone didn't mean that Percy was okay, but she felt obligated to pull herself together for the sake of engaging in a coherent conversation.

Kelsey sniffled and rubbed her nose with the back of her hand as she listened to Imago's explanation. Knowing what had happened to Percy didn't make her feel any better –by all accounts, he was still gone, and she still had no one to blame but herself and the old bastard in her head– and although it answered one question, it raised several others. "W...? Wh-Who...? Do you have any idea who did this? Or... why?"

She stood up on shaky legs, looking around at the world that the cave had led them to, only now acknowledging how eerily similar the details were to the island. That and the collateral damage... Goodness, did she do that? "I... don't really know where we are. I just followed Percy here through that cave in the cemetery..."

[DanteMGalileo]

"Who did this?" Imago scowled, feeling the dried blood that still remained on his chest. "The landlord was able to suppress my consciousness, so I only have bits to go on. I... did not see an attacker." He pulled at his sliced shirt, frowning at the scar. "But there was something piercing our chest."

The demon snarled, glancing around the ruined cemetery. "So, there was a cave in the cemetery... a cave that can lead to other worlds, it seems..." He placed a hand under his chin. "Listen. Do you hear anything? That isn't the wind or us?"

[ParamountKeymaster]

"Damn..." Kelsey's gaze turned much more wary as she examined the barren terrain. The fact that Imago couldn't see whoever had attacked him and Percy left so much open to interpretation. It made her wonder if the assailant was still around. If they were, she had very likely alerted them to her presence.

She glanced at Imago over her shoulder, then she faced the horizon again, soaking in the silence with a disquieting ache in her chest. "No. This... This place seems long dead." She nervously rubbed her arms. "It's... almost like the island... isn't it? But..."

It was hard to deduce what exactly was going on or what had happened in this world, especially with Kelsey's mind and emotions as scattered as they were. Whatever the story behind this place was, though, it clearly was a tragedy for the ages, one that she didn't want to be a late edition to. "It probably wouldn't be advisable to stick around here, but... but what about Percy? We can't just leave him like this."

[DanteMGalileo]

"Hmm... do we stick around and try and find the landlord's soul, or do we leave and save ourselves?" Imago pondered aloud. Look for the soul, or leave? Or take a third option? "Let's look around for a few minutes. If we don't see any sign of the landlord or his attacker, we go back the way we came."

He paused, lightly clenching a fist. "It would be easier if we searched from the air. Hang on... I want to experiment." With a low groan, a pair of wings slowly extended from his back, shimmering a faint purple, showing the images of dark space, lit only by a few stars. "Hmm... so, it does work... The queen did say something about wings..."

[ParamountKeymaster]

"Hmm..." Kelsey ran a hand through her hair and tilted her head as she studied Imago. "Yeah, when... when Percy sprouted wings earlier, they looked like that too. Different from how I remember him doing it the first time. I... guess that's a side effect of the qu...? Um... Well, you know..."

She bent over and picked up the discarded jar, figuring it best to keep it on her person until they made it back to the island. She might not have known how much of that creepy cat's words she should take at face value, but for the sake of getting home, she wasn't taking any chances. With the little bit of glass in hand, Kelsey easily unfolded her own flesh-colored wings and nodded to the demon. "A few minutes. I... guess I'll just have to live with that."

[DanteMGalileo]

"Hmm, if he can do... hmm, this is a prime chance for us..." Imago muttered to himself. "I will explain when we are back in our world, with or without the landlord's soul. I suppose just watch out for anything grey and glowing."

Unfurling his dark wings, Imago jumped and took to the sky. Thus far, he saw nothing moving, except what was blown by the wind. No light distortions, either. Regardless, the lack of any autonomous motion was...

Disquieting, to say the least.

"I don't like this," Imago admitted. "The world's supposed to be noisy and chaotic." As he finished, he swore he saw something move. Then a faint, vaguely explosive sound. "... Did you hear that? That door moved. Just moments later, I heard something go boom. Come on. I'm going to see if this is where our attacker took the landlord's soul..."

Descending down, Imago landed at what seemed to be Club Lobazotah, although the crumbling sign said nobody had been here in some time. Pushing lightly on the door, he found it unlocked. "... It's safe. Nobody here. Nothing but two piles of ashes and feathers."

[ParamountKeymaster]

Kelsey nodded and flew after Imago, her blue eyes turning a glowing cyan as she activated her true vision. She didn't speak as they observed the city below, still too stymied to really make sense of it all, remaining wary and reserved as if she was loathe to disrupt the all-encompassing silence.

The fact that her true vision showed her nothing that varied from the material plane was just as worrisome as the silence, if not more so. There were no souls in this place. Not even a telltale trace that any soul could've left behind. Kelsey knew that she shouldn't have been surprised, but she couldn't help but fret about it nonetheless, particularly since this brought back into question what exactly had attacked and taken Percy. Was it a creature without an aura to be traced, or maybe something that didn't exist on this plane...?

She was just about to convey this to Imago when a faint but nearby noise drew their attention, prompting Imago to follow it and Kelsey to follow him. The decrepit building they touched down in front of only seemed to confirm that this was indeed an alternate, post-apocalyptic Dimensional Island, and the sight of the ruined club was like a twisting stab through Kelsey's heart. It only got worse when Imago said something about ash and feathers; Kelsey immediately knew what he was referring to, but she hastily wedged her way inside nonetheless as if desperate to be proved wrong.

"..."

Eyes wide, jaw slacked ever so slightly, Kelsey stared at the utter mess inside the abandoned club. Then she stared into the middle distance. Then she started looking around –for what, she didn't know– whilst stumbling forward practically in a drunken stupor. "What the hell is this...?"

[DanteMGalileo]

"... O, death."

Imago would admit that this place, gods the silence, this unnatural silence... it was getting to him. Scanning the room, he saw nothing moving. "Nobody here but us and the dead." He walked over to a table, containing a plate of roasted meat and some kind of rice. Reaching over, he noted that the meat was covered in a layer of dust. Wiping it off on his coat, he took a bite, chewing slowly, and swallowing. "It's stale and dry, but it's not rotten."

Something else caught Imago's eye, a paper on the table. He picked up the paper, finding it to be a newspaper. Scanning it, he found the date. "... Hmm, I wonder..." The demon looked up, finding a wall clock.

"Can you confirm if the date and time on the clock is the same as the one in our world? If I am reading this correctly, this newspaper is a week old."

[ParamountKeymaster]

"...What??" Kelsey did a shaky about-face, looking to Imago with the wide eyes of someone who wasn't sure if the worst-case scenario really had been realized or if she had just misheard him. Then she followed Imago's gaze to the wall, spotting the clock he was alluding to. The fact that the digital device was still operating, regardless of whether it was electronic or battery-operated, already hinted at the ugly truth. The time read 12:27. The date read...

...........................

"Oh Lord..."

Kelsey stumbled back a few steps, then she dashed over to Imago in a mad, panicked scramble. "We need to get out of here. Whatever this place is, what... what if this is some alternate future for our timeline?? We need to...! B-But Percy...! We can't...!"

Their friends needed to know about this. Whatever happened to this iteration of the island couldn't happen to theirs. If judgement day really was approaching this soon, they needed to jump on board and stop it now. But were they just supposed to leave Percy's soul behind? The needs of the many, sure, but the idea of abandoning him still seemed so misguided and unfair. The moral conflict was enough to get Kelsey to cover her face to muffle her stonewalled screams.

[DanteMGalileo]

"... What is one soul, weighed against many, many more?" Imago folded his arms behind his back, walking away from the table and to the staircase. "Even if that one soul is that of my landlord, I do not believe any soul is worth any more than another's." An underlying tone of regret.

He started up the staircase. "The noise seems to originate from the second floor. I'm going to see if the hideous stealer of souls wound up here and set something off." Upon reaching the next floor, Imago's nose crumpled slightly. "Normally, I despise this smell. But... it feels so... familiar..." Shaking his head, Imago followed the stench, stopping before a door that appeared to have had its hinges blown off. "Magic. Or something close to magic." He gestured to a purple burn mark. Inhaling and mentally bracing himself, Imago took a few steps into this room...



"... What the fuck?!"

Imago took a few steps back, noticing the contents of this room. A table had been tossed to the side, and a white sheet was strewn across the floor, contrasting with a red blossom along it. At the origin of the rose...

"... How?"

Imago, slowly, cautiously walked towards the origin of the bloody flower. "Hang on, this sod's got a jacket and hood..." He slowly removed the hood, revealing...

...

"What the fuck?! It's... it's the landlord! Or another version of his body!" Rolling the corpse over, blood came from its mouth. On its face were two blue markings. Lifting up on eyelid with a wince, Imago noted dull blue eyes...

"... Okay. I've got nothing here. Just completely and utterly creeped the fuck out."

[ParamountKeymaster]

Kelsey said nothing, merely staring sadly at Imago as he stepped aside and started walking upstairs. She understood what he was getting at. Getting Percy back wasn't going to make much of a difference if everything else went to hell. But if it really was within her power to avoid making that sacrifice, she still very much wanted to find him. It was all a matter of what if. What if this future really was their own? What if they couldn't find Percy before disaster struck? She had so many questions and none of the answers.

Without knowing what else to do, Kelsey meekly followed Imago up the staircase, waiting by the sidelines as he peeked inside one of the rooms. The mortified reaction was one thing; coming from the elder demon, though, it felt so much worse. She was almost too scared to take a look for herself, but she eventually caved shortly after Imago entered the room and leaned over to take a look at...

Oh, Christ...

She choked on her words, letting out little more than a shudder. She grabbed the door frame, desperate for support as her knees threatened to give out. Her sanity had not yet recovered from the sight of Percy's dead body. Seeing it again... seeing it in a form she could only interpret as the inverse of what Imago had become...

Stomach... Stomach hurting... Head spinning... Don't throw up... Don't throw up...

Kelsey leaned her head against a wall. Sheer horror was plastered on her face as the waterworks again started to slip out.

Mortal men who walk the line, heavenly beings borne of pure Essence, demons spawned from the foulest Blight; all will seek the beast. Seek to destroy it. To create it. To shape it to their whims. Desperate to upset that unparalleled equilibrium and let balance be disrupted in their favor. And so will begin a new era, marked by that hallowed beast's footsteps. Those who see it to its end will triumph, but none will be safe until it ushers in the sun and moon's return.

"What have I done...?"