Ch. 5 Of Letters and Dreams

A day after the unknown Boy's arrival Professor Dumbledore was, as usual, going over his paperwork.

That was, until the floo wards chimed to announce a floo call. Waving his wand absently to receive the call, Professor Dumbledore looked over to the fireplace.

It was Saul Croaker, the Head of the Department of Mysteries, and an old friend of his. As usual, he didn't waste any time getting to the point.

"Albus! We've got a problem! Can I come on through?"

Indeed, as Professor Dumbledore stared at the other man a short while later, his friend was more than a bit pale, clutching at his cup of hot tea with the air of someone that had gotten unpleasant news.

"So, what happened, Saul?"

"Nothing good, I'm afraid. An Ancient Prophecy activated, one that was made by Merlin himself more than a thousand years ago. To none other than Rowena Ravenclaw!"

Professor Dumbledore blinked. "How could this be? Merlin lived almost 300 years before the Founders!"

Croaker grimaced. " There are certain...rumours that Merlin is immortal. Over the last centuries, there have been several sightings of the man. Some of the rumours were of course false, but we...acquired a bit of his magical signature back in the 20's, and compared it with one of Merlin's relics. It matched."

"So that man I told you about in the late 50's..."

"Could have very well been him, yes."

The old men shared a grimace, knowing the blessings of one of their ancestors still being alive, but also the terrible temptation Merlin's very existence bore in a world that was far from immortal.

Professor Dumbledore picked up the sheet Croaker silently placed in front of him. Picking it up, the old Headmaster could feel a headache begin. Because a prophecy always was spoken to someone directly involved by the prophecy, whether their part was small or large in foretold events didin't.

He sighed. Those were indeed going to be interesting times.

Meanwhile Sora was having a strange dream.

Because his heart was still deeply asleep, his consciousness had withdrawn rather deeply inside of it, diving deeper than it would normally do.

Sora looked around. His surroundings lay in complete darkness, bearing a strong resemblance to the paths shortly before the Door to Darkness. He was shivering as he remembered the titanic struggle against "Ansem" back then. They'd barely made it out alive by the skin of their teeth, green as they were back then.

Indeed, their exhaustion back then had been the reason Namine had been able to sneak up on them and steal their memories a few miles away from Castle Oblivion.

Shrugging his shoulders Sora began walking on the path, wondering after a while why it felt like he should be in a hurry despite the path stretching on for miles ahead.

It was this faint sense of urgency and disquiet in the back of his mind that made Sora walk faster soon, increasing his pace until he was running at top speeds.

On and on the path went, gently rising up and down, sometimes curving in a strange way. After what felt like an eternity Sora could make out a small spot of colour in the far distance. Hoping that whatever was there would lead to the exit he doubled his efforts. Ahead there was a sudden split in the road, one seeming to go up, while the other one still went straight ahead. Coming to a stop in front of the fork Sora looked at the paths.

The right one was a long stairway, glimmering white and ending at a set of gates at the top.

And the left one a rather beaten up looking path, with cracked and sometimes missing stones, and rather grimy to boot.

While puzzling over which path to take Sora suddenly heard a whisper echo around.

"Which path do you wish to choose?"

Sora whirled around, but no one was in sight either behind or in front of him. Still, the voice continued speaking.

"You can go on to heaven, you know. You more than earned it, and while there's no one waiting for you there yet, your loved ones will eventually rejoin you.

…...Or you can choose to live on, but know that you have a long way to go before your eyes can open again. That road will be harsh and perilous…..

So I ask you again, little traveller, which path do you choose?"

That stopped Sora short for a while. Just for a moment he was tempted to choose the stairs and leave behind all his worldly pains and problems….but like so many times before, Sora chose not to take the easier path.

"Thanks for the offer but I'm not ready for heaven yet. I still have a lot to do, Plus….there are some people I can't just leave behind yet.", finished Sora with a clear and determined look.

The voice snorted.

"As you wish then. Good luck."

With that the voice faded away again, and Sora still listened for any further sounds, but everything was quiet. So he shrugged and started running for the left path straight ahead without looking back.

After running for a while, still feeling like something was tugging on him, Sora heard a noise behind him. Stopping to look what was going on, Sora wondered if he had imagined that at the far back the path he left behind was missing some bricks. Just then another brick broke off frome the side of the path and tumbled down into the neverending abyss.

Sora gulped. Turning on the spot, he ran on, this time a bit faster than before.

The noises behind him followed him though, growing louder as time went on.

Now scared out of his mind Sora finally hit top speed, nearly flying along the path. Just as he thought he wouldn't make it, he saw a door on the horizon. Grimly Sora prepared for some bruised shoulders, thinking to ram it open before it was too late.

Just as well then that the door swung open before Sora could hit having time to scream, Sora fell off the end of the path and down into an ominously glowing vortex.

Back on the path, an amused chuckle could be heard.

"Good luck brat. You'll need it."

A.N.: Yeah, I'm back. This time with a chapter that sat around unfinished on my pc for a good week now. Shouldn't be too long until Ch. 6 now, a part of it is already written.

Many thanks to Scififan/Kirallie and my friend Martina, this little piece wouldn't have been possible withouth them :D

P.S.: There's a saying about how no feedback at all is worse than a bad one. Sorry this story is more than a bit messy. If I'm ever done with this story I'll propably overhaul it a bit, but until then this is going to stick. Because if I second-guess this story now, It will make me quit, and I refuse to quit.

I'll clean it up a bit though later though :D