Xena and Hercules belong to Renaissance Pictures

Broken Mirrors

For the simple men, the concept of reality was quite certain.

Beneath them was the soil, the Earth, above them the sky, the sun that warmed the world at day and at night the stars and the moon. And somewhere in between or above, the gods or in case of the Israelites, the Elisans and others, the One God who ruled all there is.

Some of the more intellectual ones of course, were aware that things were a bit more complex than this. Not even the most educated however understood just how much more.

A secret truth was the fact that there was not only one world, but countless universes that existed in proximity to each other.

But this was something that barely anybody was aware of, at least in this age, except for the few who had experienced it first hand.

xxx

One small group of such beings existed at this moment in a world that was not even their own.

Their names were Xena, Callisto, Gabrielle and Sarah- an alternate version of Gabrielle´s niece. They were not from the reality they currently lived in. In fact, to be more precise, they were not even all from the same reality originally.

Yet they had spent the last four years together, in that particular realm.

For them, the adventure began with their mission to the so called cursed town, a place that had somehow drifted between the dimensions.

There they had been confronted with the ancient goddess named Chaos, who had been responsible for the phenomenon.

They barely found a way to escape, to one of the worlds where some of the members of their united group came from. For most of them it was not truly home, but they decided to stay, for the time being.

This world´s version of Greece and the surrounding areas had been under the rule of a vicious group of tyrants.

These were ironically nobody else than the alternate versions of Xena herself, Ares, Gabrielle, Hope and Eve who originally existed in this world. They had helped to form a rebellion against their own counterparts, together with the Perdicas and Aphrodite of this reality and also with Delilah, a Destroyer daughter of Ares and Hope, who had joined their group and they had been leading the people to victory in a 1 year long war.

But without them knowing it, Chaos had followed them.

Here she once again continued her self-given task, to speed up the process of entropy in the universe, and bring desolation, disorder and finally, complete annihilation.

While they were still fighting their own war against the self-proclaimed rulers of Greece, the ancient goddess had at the same time started her own line of terror, completely obliterating one of the lands' greatest towns, decimating armies.

Under the influence of her power, normal humans from several places were turned into monsters, mutated into bizarre monstrosities that represented her insane ideas about change and `progress´…. All of that of course for the ultimate purpose to let it all perish someday anyway.

As she herself had told them, the `ultimate purpose´ of the universe was to turn into dust. The only question was how long it would take and how `interesting´ the way to that end goal would be.

It was just after the decisive battle and the final defeat of the so called `Emperor´ Ares and his Queens that Chaos decided to show herself openly. That was now over three years ago.

Back then, something happened that took them all by great surprise…She gave them time, a respite if you wanted to call it that. Without creating any more damage, Chaos just stood down and left. Afterwards, their current world had been at peace, for awhile.

They all knew, she was doing this only because she found them all interesting as she herself had put it, in some twisted sort of way at least and maybe, because at some level they had managed to impress her. On top of that, she was doing it all for one simple reason: because she simply felt like it.

This was one of the many unsettling things about her. Chaos, she truly lived up to her name. While it was true that she acted inside a greater frame and this frame was simply the end of everything, her behavior was rather unstable, unpredictable and sometimes depending of sheer coincidence. Life or death, it made no real difference to her.

She was the type of person who, with the same move was just as likely to shake your hand as to rip out your heart.

To her, the world was destined for destruction. So nothing truly counted except for the question how and maybe when? In some ways she was the perfect nihilist, and that with the power of one of the strongest gods in existence.

Three years, that was the time she had `generously´ given to them, expecting them to prepare for her return, all to make things more interesting.

And preparing was exactly what they had done.

During the last three years they had contacted every Pantheon of Gods that still existed on this world and that they were able to reach. This meant the ones that were not destroyed either by Dahak or by the Twilight Prophecy.

But they had been also looking in Greece itself. Their Gabrielle had been researching old scriptures and legends.

As it seemed, once, many thousands of years before, a group of the Primordial Gods had come together and managed to actually banish Chaos from their reality. Sadly, she couldn´t find anything specific, like how they had done it. She wasn´t even quite sure about the names of the particular gods involved. It varied in the different versions of the story.

The group also travelled north and made contact with Odin, who was not happy at all to see Xena since he had several past problems with her, until they had managed to convince him that this was not the same Xena he had known.

As he heard why they had come, he was willing to cooperate.

They later met the Gods of India and then the ones of Egypt.

In all those places they kept looking for a way to stop Chaos and as it turned out, they actually found a few useful things. For instance, they came across the story of an artifact called the Eye of Ra, that had once been used as a weapon against the Egyptian god of the darkness called Apep.

In fact, in many countries they found hints of super-natural objects like this one that could be used to fight off the harbingers of evil.

The so called `Stone of Creation´ was another good example of such similar items. It had been used by the Titans in their battle against Dahak and had been rediscovered by Hercules around 30 years ago. It could channel the power of the God of Light and temporary disable even Dahak himself in physical form.

The question was whether such an object would also work against Chaos, who was not always seen as a plain manifestation of the Darkness, even if she certainly acted like it.

But as it seemed, they couldn´t find the current location of the Stone anyway. They were only able to find out that Hercules had stored it in a safe place thirty years ago, after exorcizing Dahak from Iolaus body. But now it was gone and nobody really knew where.

What they finally discovered brought little encouragement in that matter.

As it turned out, during their reign over the country, Hope as one of the Queens had found out the whereabouts of the Stone and made sure that it would never be used again. It seemed that she had literally removed it from the face of the world. In other words, this was a dead end, another thing they had to thank their tyrannical counterparts for.

xxx

A short time later, they travelled to Egypt, originally just to try to form an alliance with their Pantheon, but then, as they had heard about it, to find the Eye of Ra.

They weren´t even sure if it could help in the beginning. They had only heard that it had once helped the Egyptians to defeat an ancient `chaos god´ and recognized that it appeared to possess some similarities with the Stone of Creation. So far, that didn´t sound bad.

All that was based however just on the stories that the local deities and some mortals had told them. Anyway, given how serious the situation was, it couldn´t hurt to try.

Sure, they had already gained an impressive force. With Odin, the Egyptians and a few of the remaining Olympians, they already had members of three Pantheons on their side. To that came some support from the Indian Gods, the little they could give them so far away from their Realm.

If it came to a direct confrontation, they had for sure more than enough strength to fight Chaos off.

The sad truth was however was that while they could overpower her easily with their new alliance of gods, Odin, Horus, Aphrodite, Isis, none of them actually knew how to remove her from this world for good or had a clear idea about how to kill her.

That information, as it looked, had been lost in time.

They didn´t even know if Chaos could be killed at all. By all that they knew, she could be one of the few deities that were truly immortal. If that were true they were, to say it plainly, screwed.

That would have meant that they could defeat her a thousand times over and she would always be back, while more and more people would be killed, the land would be devastated once again and nothing would change at all.

It reminded Xena of the story that Gabrielle had told them about Ra and Apep, who was called Apophis in Greek.

According to the legend, every new morning, the Sun God Ra would fight this terrible deity who was attacking him in the form of a giant serpent so that the sun could rise and the day could begin.

Every day, Apep was defeated and even `killed´ only to rise once again the following morning. This continued for nearly 3000 years, until the Eye of Ra was forged and helped the God banish him for good.

If their worst suspicions about Chaos were indeed true, they might actually face a similar situation here. That was the reason they were looking for the Eye of Ra now.

But here they were in for far more than they had bargained for. As it turned out, they were not the only people searching for the artifact.

Once they finally located it inside an old temple close to the area of Armana, they were confronted with two people they knew all too well- the version of Hope from this world and her mother Gabrielle, two of the former Queens of Greece.

By all they had been told, they were now pretty sure that Apep was in fact nothing else than an incarnation of Dahak.

He was directly opposing not only Ra, but the entire Egyptian Pantheon. Should he ever win for good, he would plunge the entire world into darkness and bring down the cosmos as they knew it. The similarities between the two deities were obvious.

Ra on the other hand, who they had actually never met in person, could as well have been an avatar of the Light. By what they had heard from the other gods, he had not been seen or heard of on Earth since the time Apep had been banished. Gradually, other gods had taken over in their place.

This theory was also able to explain how Hope had found out about the Eye of Ra and why she was interested in it. Just like the Stone of Creation- she saw it as a possible threat to herself. In this case however she didn´t just want to destroy it, she had found out about the other´s interest and planned to use it as a bargaining chip against them.

The fight that broke out over the control of the artifact was fierce. It was Xena, Callisto, Gabrielle, Sarah and two Egyptian warriors that their gods had sent with them as assistance, against Hope, her mother and three former soldiers of their armies as they had still ruled over Greece.

With one telekinetic move, Hope broke the neck of one of their Egyptian `guides´ and with the next she threw Xena several meters through the air until she crashed against the temple-wall.

Simultaneously, Callisto and Sarah, together with the other Egyptian fighter, went into a sword fight with their three soldiers.

These three were known war-criminals who had committed atrocities against civilians. If they had stayed in Greece, they would have risked to be imprisoned or even executed, so they decided instead to stay with their two former Queens, even after their fall. At least Hope´s raw power represented some measure of safety from any kind of law.

But now, their luck had run out. Callisto struck the first one down after less than a half minute. Her partner, Sarah, killed the second as he tried to struck her in the back. The last one was now hopelessly outmatched.

Both Gabrielles kept out of the fight, for completely different reasons however.

The native former Queen Gabrielle had lost an arm during the last battle and in her current crippled state, there was not much she could do.

Hope had made a few relative half-hearted attempts to get some immortal or maybe a supernaturally gifted human to offer her a replacement for her arm. Hephaestus could have certainly done it if he had still been alive…

But if she were honest with herself, she actually preferred the more docile state her mother was forced into right now…. More subverted to her will. Now however, as she saw her warriors falling one by one, she certainly regretted not having tried harder.

The other Gabrielle was busy trying to decipher the hieroglyphs around the holding place of the Eye of Ra that they had found. After a few more minutes, she had managed to translate the writings and knew how to remove the object from its place.

The `Eye of Ra´ was a gold covered ornament that was holding a bright transparent jewel in its center. She finally understood how it was used.

The Bard was holding the artifact up in her right hand, and she was now standing right in the center of the temple. A gap had been purposely left in the ceiling. As the daylight began to shine on the Eye of Ra, it was reflected by the gemstone and Gabrielle directed it to the alternate version of her daughter.

As soon as Hope was hit by the light, she was thrown to the ground and was now struggling to stand up.

"Mo...mother," she stammered as the dark powers she was using were temporally bound by the light that the eye had conjured.

She wasn´t even completely sure which of the two Gabrielles she had addressed, herself or the other one or maybe both.

Under different circumstances, she might have hesitated. But during the last years she had seen just how much destruction, terror and suffering this version of her daughter and her own alternate self had truly caused and they had not even been doing it in the name of Dahak or something, but just for themselves.

She was worse than the Hope she herself had born, far worse. After all she had seen, she really had absolutely no sympathy left for these two.

They all knew by now that Hope could not, maybe never, truly be killed. But at least they would remove this version from this world for as long as possible.

The other Gabrielle was watching in horror what was happening.

Xena had her sword drawn and stepped closer and closer to her opponent.

"This is not over," Hope told her.

"I know," Xena answered, right before she cut off her head. "Is she gone?" she asked Gabrielle.

"If what I read over there is true, it should take her a very long time until she is able to recreate her body."

"Good," she replied.

After this, the other Gabrielle, who was the last remaining of her group, surrendered nearly instantly.

xxx

All this had happened 13 months ago. Three years had now passed and just like promised, Chaos was back.

First, as if wanting to announce her return, she destroyed another town in Greece with the help of a `natural disaster´ and hundreds of people lost their lives.

They all knew instantly that it was her.

One of the first things she did was to cause the fall of the metaphysical walls between the Realms of the Pantheons, world-wide. This led to a great deal of tumult and unrest all over the globe.

All of the gods were now able to use their powers everywhere on the planet. On the other hand, the supplies of these powers were no longer safe. Many of the gods depended in fact of the worship of the mortals to stay strong. To that came the sources of ambrosia, nectar and other `divine nourishments´ that were always located inside their Realms.

So far, he members of every Pantheon had complete power and control inside and over their own Realm, but only there. The borders were flexible, depending on the spreading of their followers over the lands. But it meant that every group of gods who needed them, always had a safe resource of mortals to worship them.

Now that Indian, Norse and Egyptian Gods had their full power on Greek soil and Olympians in turn had all their strength at places like India, the North Land or Chin, struggle and conflict over the faith of the remaining mortal worshippers and possible wars between the different Pantheons were due to break out sooner or later, especially with cults such as the one of the One God gaining more and more ground on Greek and Roman territory. To that came the fact that their `food sources´ were no longer safe from possible attackers.

It was also something that might have been able to throw a wedge into their alliance with the other gods, but so far they were holding together very well.

All in all, it was exactly the kind of move you would expect from the goddess named Chaos.

This had however also many good sides for them, since their allies from the other Realms could now actively help them in Greece.

Another one of her victims was the Ares of this world. He was found dead in one of his temples by two of his priests, the few who were left. They could not even say for sure how he was killed.

He was not exactly one that many people would miss, given all he had done. Only Aphrodite appeared to show some traces of sadness. In spite of his actions, he was her brother after all. By what they had heard, he had been just a shadow of his old self anyway since the Xena of this world had died.

All this happened during the course of a few weeks.

xxx

Now they were standing together in front of their common enemy. She was in the shape of the same dark haired young woman like three years ago.

They all had been preparing the ritual that they hoped would free them from her for good. It was a nearly exact replica of the one that had been used to banish Apep from their world a long time ago.

Horus, the current head of the Egyptian gods was, in human form, standing in the center of their group, leading the ceremony. Next to him was the Eye of Ra, that was now mounted on top of a long staff that he was holding with his right hand. They could only hope that it would work.

"I see you have really managed to come up with something interesting," Chaos told them with a shrewd smile on her face, throwing a globe of bright glowing energy at them, aiming right into the middle of their group, trying to blast them apart. But somehow, the power that the ritual was creating shielded them and her attack was recoiled.

The smile vanished from her features. She remembered the way she had originally been banished from the physical world and she thought this here was just the same. But it was something different. This ritual here was more complex, more powerful, more…. advanced

They had truly found a magnificent weapon against her, she thought. She had wanted a truly interesting challenge and she got it. The only sad part was that it might actually be too much.

She felt the immense power concentrated on her, the power of the Light, the primary Force of Creation and she felt how her physical manifestation was slowly breaking apart under it and how her essence was slowly being drawn back again into the void between the worlds, where she had resided for so long.

In front of all of them, she did something that none of them would have expected right now, she started to laugh full-heartedly.

"I see you truly did not disappoint," she said to them. "You actually did it, you found a way to overcome me."

She was still laughing.

"You win," she told them, "….for now. It doesn´t matter though. Whether it is in a hundred years or in a hundred-thousand or in a million, sooner or later this world will come to it´s demise, like every other world...and I will walk along with it on every step of it. Sooner or later things will come to my way," she declared while her physical body was slowly breaking apart.

Sooner or later this world will come to it´s demise, like every world and I will get along with it on every step. Sooner or later thing will get to my way," she declared while her physical body was slowly breaking apart.

"I do admit however that you have truly managed to impress me. So until then, let me give you a small present," she stated.

While she said this, a light dim glow surrounded Xena, Callisto, Gabrielle, Delilah and Sarah for a few moments, right before Chaos' physical form turned to dust.