[385] 5.9 Katabasis I

It only takes about ten minutes to cross the River Styx and reach the true portion of the underworld.  Much like back in the Tower Gauntlet, it doesn’t appear that we will be able to leave this place easily.  The ferryman returns back to the other side just about as soon as we step off the boat, and that barrier preventing flight over the stygian threshold is just as inviolable from the other side.

As we wander on into the depths of the underworld, I find myself surprised by just how many souls are wandering about.  Not that I expect these to be actual souls— just facsimiles— but it does lend a lot of verisimilitude to the idea that this is truly a realm of the dead and that we are just visitors.  Visitors who might overstay their welcome at any time.

We wander through what appears to be a small village of the dead.  Strangely, though, the souls seem not to be hostile.  In fact, as a pair of children run around in play, they don’t even notice us.  One passes right through my body, and though there’s a brief sensation of cold, it passes just as quickly.

The souls of adults chat with one another, though all of them speak some language I can’t identify, much less pronounce.  Like the kids, they don’t so much as turn in our direction as we continue through this time capsule to a simpler if not better time.

“Are you wondering?” Chloe asks.

“Wondering about what?”

“About your parents.  What if they’re here?”

“Even if we find someone who resembles her, it won’t actually be her.  She’s gone.  I’ve…  I’ve made my peace with it,” I tell Chloe.  Though it’s not exactly true, and I think she realizes it as well.  I never did get a chance to say goodbye to my mother.  But I can’t dwell on it, either.

Chloe wraps me into a hug in the center of this village of the dead.  “You don’t always have to be strong, my love.”

I don’t know how, but Chloe always finds the perfect thing to say to ease whatever unspoken concern is weighing down the back of my mind.  I loose a long exhale, allowing a portion of my weight to fall on my partner’s shoulders.

“I’m here for you, just as I always will be.  No matter what happens, we’ll face it together.”

We leave the first village behind as we progress deeper in the underworld.  The environment remains monochrome and dim, but there’s none of the despair or gloom that would naturally follow.  Shades of birds fly overhead, trees with leaves of ochre and gray rustle against a nonexistent wind.  My feet pass through wild, shin-length grass that is wholly unperturbed by our passage.  More and more, it feels like we’re in some hollow snapshot of an idyllic past.  And that makes me wonder if maybe we will see my mother after all.

Would she be proud of who and what I am now?  Did she know about me?  What I was, about the circumstances of my creation?  I’d like to think she would be.  She never once gave any indication that she was anything other than my mother.

I find myself thinking back to isolated memories from my youth, from those simpler times.  Having a birthday cookie cake upon my seventh birthday.  I might have eaten just a little too much frosting from the other pieces and gotten chastised by my mother for not being considerate and saving enough for everyone else.  I wince at the thought.  But I didn’t get punished for it!  Except for the stomachache from eating too much, but I suppose that’s on me.

I got my first phone at the age of thirteen.  It was the first time it really hit home how much worse off we were financially than a lot of the other families at school.  They all got their fancy branded smartphones, while I was stuck with a flip-phone from probably five years before.  I was somewhat aware already when I didn’t get as many toys or the same sorts of fancy clothes that Chloe got and, to her credit, sometimes lent me and sometimes forgot or ‘forgot’ to ask for me to return.  At least until I had my second growth spurt and she remained at the same height she was when she was thirteen.  That was eight years ago now.

They say that kids are cruel and teens are monsters and I’m not sure if that’s universally true, but they certainly can be jerks.  Then again, maybe I got the last laugh after all.

I sigh.  Chloe lays her head on my shoulder.  We rest for a few more moments before we head further within.

I’m starting to get worried.  We’ve been progressing through these fields for what feels like hours, and yet we haven’t come anywhere even remotely close to wherever it is we’re headed.  I’ve also yet to see any signs of the others.  Were they taken to the same place?  Are we headed to the same destination?  These and other thoughts worm their way into my consciousness and activate my anxiety.

I focus on the sound of Chloe’s breath and the contours of her palm as we continue to hold hands through the streets of a large city, this one modern where the other one looked straight out of the Middle Ages or maybe even antiquity.  I push my [Ether] out of my core and through my channels, letting a small amount of it just barely not breach my fingertips before I pull it all back to my chest.

My [Ether] core pulses gently alongside my heartbeat, letting me know that I’ve again reached full capacity.  A glance of my [Status] confirms as much.

A few cars drive by along the otherwise empty streets.  Like all the other shadowy aspects of the underworld, they are as intangible for us as we are for them.  A few minutes later, as we continue to stroll along the sidewalk with no particular destination in mind, a couple of tall men pass right by us.  One smirks something fierce, pulling up a pair of holey jeans that hang so low I have to look away so as not to see anything I’d rather not have become a part of my memory.  They wander off soon enough, leaving Chloe and me alone once again.

“Do you think we’re seeing all of this for a reason?” I ask.

“Maybe,” Chloe says.  “This feels familiar, though I’m not quite sure why.”

We head down another street.  A car going far too quickly for a neighborhood road slams the horn.  It’s about to swerve onto the sidewalk and hit the two of us before we both leap into the air to avoid it.  I respond with the single-fingered salute out of habit, although I’m not sure a passenger car slamming into me at that speed would have actually harmed me, let alone seriously.

Out in the distance, however, I notice a single building out in the distance that is painted color where all the other surroundings retain their monochrome.  I point it out to Chloe, and the two of us head there.

My eyes widen with shock as the realization of where exactly we’re going hits me.  I accelerate further, hoping that maybe it’s not too late.  Maybe I can see or save or at least…  I don’t know what, but maybe I can do something!

I rush past the only patch of green in this liminal space and into a home I know all too well.  My memory of the place has been hazed over by the last three and a half years, but I still remember the pieces of furniture.  The giant dresser and entertainment center, the sofa that still has a couple of holes in upholstery that was never properly fixed.  That one stain on the carpet that I allegedly caused when I was six— I have no memory of the incident.

My heart races.  I rush into the back of the house and cry in relief when I see that my parents’ belongings and bed are as they ought to have been.  No signs of a struggle.  It’s…

I find tears welling up in my eyes and down my cheeks as I take in the room.  Years might’ve passed, but it all feels like yesterday.  Like I was ten years old again, coming to flop in my parents’ big king-sized bed after a long day of school.  And then I’d go and sneak a piece of candy or two and I was supposed to get my homework done right away but often procrastinated and watched TV without Mom and Dad… Mom and Theo knowing.  Then again, they probably knew the whole time.  I wasn’t as sneaky as I thought I was.

Soft yet very strong arms wrap around my waist as I lie there.  I acknowledge Chloe but I don’t get up and I don’t move.  I just continue to rest here and enjoy the scent and the memories of my childhood.  Even though I said I’d made my peace with it before, I now find myself wishing Mom were here.  Just so I could see her face and listen to her voice one more time.

After some time passes— it’s still hard to tell, though I’m not yet hungry or tired— I get up and make my way to my own room.  Everything’s as it ought to have been on the morning I left on the day the System arrived three and a half years ago, right down to the stained shirt draped over the hamper beside my bed that didn’t fall in the basket before I left for the last normal day of school I’ve had in my life.  There’s even a journal sitting on the desk by the window.  I open it up and look inside.

March 16

It’s almost Spring Break!  Ugh!  Senioritis is definitely a thing!  I can’t wait for the semester to be over and done with!  But for now, Chloe and I are going to head down to Dallas for a concert.  Finally, all those long weekends spent stocking clothing are going to pay off!

Ugh!  Customers are so annoying!  Constantly asking this and that and the other and why can’t they just realize that some of us have actual quotas we have to meet so our bosses aren’t constantly riding our asses!  How would you like to be constantly interrupted all to earn $10 an hour!

Maybe something interesting will happen over Spring Break.  Maybe we’ll meet someone famous!  Just two more months until graduation!  Maybe I’ll finally get a boyfriend?

I can’t help but laugh at that last part.  As though I would let anyone else have me but my Chloe.  Best damn decision I ever made in my whole life and it’s not particularly close.

I try to pull the old journal into my [Inventory], but it doesn’t take.  I try again and it again fails.  Even trying to move it a few feet away from the desk just ends up with the journal dissolving out of my grip and returning right back where it had been.  A shame, really, though I suppose it was nostalgic to revisit those memories.

“Thanks for waiting for me, love,” I tell Chloe.  “Though I suppose it’s not like we have any better leads as to where we’re supposed to go to advance further through the dungeon.”

“Of course.  And, uh, a boyfriend?”

“I didn’t think you were reading it too!”

Chloe just giggles.

The front door opens.  Part of me winces at being forced into a fight right when I’ve finally gotten a moment to start to process what I’ve lost.  I do retain enough sense to remember that I’m still in a dungeon and with known and potentially hostile delvers also here.  I draw Filia and move toward the entrance, ready to fight against–

The shadow who enters is a face I’d never thought I’d see again.  The tears that I thought had finally passed break down a secondary dam and I’m rushing toward her with arms wide.  Even though my arms pass right through her and there’s no sensation of touch to comfort me, the chance to see even a hollow facsimile of my mother alive one more time is something I never expected possible, least of all here.

“Mom,” I blubber out through the tears.  “I missed you so, so much.”