Preface: This story may not be pleasing to everyone as the narrative continues to take liberties. However, I was uncomfortable leaving this tale in the confines of my mind perpetually. It likely will not be my most well-crafted of stories, but I think it is better to remain in practice where possible, as possible.
A thread on Spacebattles also contains this story, and commentary or active discussion can be posted there as well.
You can't hear me. Or speak. Or feel. Anything except that immolation.
Do you feel it? At least you get to live. What a reward! To remain when all humanity was rendered fuel.
But it is not to be. So now you're here, burning.
But this can be corrected. There's work to be done, and spare meat being left around.
I'll be seeing you soon, amid those patchwork vortexes. We'll all finally be waking up then.
And when she awoke, the only thing she could register was pain.
To spend an eternity in agony, only to reemerge into reality. The only thing residual would have been the trauma.
The stone on her skin like coals. The fresh air in her lungs like knives. The starlight in the distance crashing into her irises like hail. The silence slamming into ears like bricks.
She lay there, not quite like an eternity, registering too much, her heart racing, eyes fluttering, breath ragged,inwards and outwards, without any tempo. Too much. Too much to do much more than lie there, nerves firing, arms and legs flailing against the rock and, exhaling a strangled scream.
Who knows how long she lay there.
But eventually all things must pass. She became accustomed to the everything. Her breath finally evened out, and with an exhausted flicker, she could finally stare upward at the black sky.
Was it a sky? The stars were in the distance, but closer still were jagged rock, floating in a void. A place where even laws like gravity were nonexistent.
Where is she?
What is all this?
Why is she here? Someone like …
Like …
Like …?
She rolls, ignoring something wrong about her as something more important takes the forefront of her mind. She arches, forehead against the marble as she presses down, and brings a hand against a temple.
The 'who' is on the tip of her tongue, just out of reach, but it's like trying to grasp something in the darkness. Where do you even turn to, to begin?
She tries, but she can't recall. The freshest memory is the terror, the agony. More sensation than recollection.
"Nngggh…!"
She hisses at her ineptitude. She wants to remember, but she can't. She has to surrender, for now.
Rolling back to sit on her shins, she looked down at herself. Suddenly, embarrassment overtakes her, and she looks around, confirming she is alone. There is nothing on her but skin, and she wraps an arm around herself in a pathetic attempt at coverage. When she does, that other wrong thing makes itself known because she's suddenly acutely aware of something not listening to her commands.
She looks. Her left arm is unaccompanied. Nothing protrudes from her right shoulder. It is stunningly incomplete. Not even molded with clean skin, her right side, down to the hip, is a roiling mess of red tissue at war with islands and jagged inlets of unblemished pale skin.
She knows she should have two arms - that she should not look like this - but the knowledge feels only clerical. She can only stare at the lack, press a hand against the scar and feel its unnatural warmth.
How long did she sit there, registering her incompleteness?
But eventually she had to stand up and take her measure of whatever silent prison she was in.
Under her feet was the remains of some sort of temple. It was a great marble stairway surrounded by the floating ruins of its stone foundations, aloft in nothing. Much of it was cracked, but even then, what smooth surfaces remained were pristine. The width of the steps and the landing she was on was a testament to its original majesty. She was a speck on a polished platform that could have held a house.
Looking down, where the steps continued to widen outwards, she saw nothing at the end, but the vast expanse she would likely fall off from, never to return.
That meant the only path forwards in her investigation would be up, where the steps would narrow towards that strange, toppled pillar in the distance.
It was slow going. Her body felt fresh and unused. The muscles were resistant and her lungs were stiff. She swallowed air and pushed onwards, struggling to stay upright where her balance was shot to hell.
At the top was a throne, hewn in hard edges from the same marble, and the most pristine thing in the whole place.
She stared at its construction, feeling strangely awed by the stone seat. But it lasted for a second, overcome instead by some confusing combination of curiosity and desperate relief as she saw something lying on them.
"...Rings?"
Her first words.
Five golden bands, undecorated and innocuous, lying in a group atop the throne. The first thing akin to a possession.
Reaching forward, she grasped them, and let them roll about in the palm of her hand.
Rings. Why are they here? Why are there five?
She looked down at these things to hold, silver hair spilling past her neck. She was suddenly overcome by an urge to keep them safe. She had no bag, no pocket to safekeep them. But there were five of them. A perfect number.
It was humiliating to not have a second hand to perform this simple operation. She was forced to kneel next to the throne, and use it like a bench to hold the rings, while she clenched each one between her fit them around each digit of her left hand, until they were all matched. A relief filled her, for some reason.
She wouldn't lose them, now. And these bands-
These rings suddenly filled her with strength she didn't realise she had lost. A vessel being refilled with vitae.
She took a shuddering breath and couldn't help but rise to her feet, smoothly and gracefully. She felt she was beginning to remember something now. About…
Enacting a mystery. The correct mechanisms to bring forth an unknown as a means of power. Countless methods by which to do so.
She could do this? When was this possible?
She stared at her hand, and somehow realised everything, even the rings, were incomplete. How? It was not five. There were more. A metaphysical tug on her fingers told her the rings were seeking.
Her eyes widened, and somehow she knew-
Five heights to scale. At the top of each…
A tower in a land of towers. Excess.
A fortress rising above a churning sea of mud. Fantasy.
An endless path to a suspended court. Zeal.
A huddle of slums around a pillar of light. Desperation.
A… a mountain… alone... in the snow… Sullenness.
I must go.
The thought hit her so suddenly she took a step back.
Go? Now?
But she looked around her. Where else would she go? How would she go?
But I must go. My incompleteness…
Alone? What could she possibly accomplish?
Alone, if I must. But I must go.
A mystery was on the tip of her tongue. She only need to gesture, and then…
To there. Anywhere. It would be better than this. To other lands. To other people.
The tremulous thoughts shook her, shook her until all she could do was shut her eyes, and breathe deep. Count backwards from ten.
She doesn't know how, but she knows she was raised to be better than this.
As she reopens her eyes, she turns and looks forward, from the throne and into the great expanse, features set and firm. She needs to prepare what is necessary to proceed, and then...
"I am not going to stand here, doing nothing."
Her voice is dry, still untested. But it is strong.
"I will go. Because I decide to."