Kaitlyn moaned in pain, and felt tears come to her eyes before she was fully conscious. She swallowed, hard, and let out a cry of despair and hurt. She could hardly get air into her lungs. She felt as though everything had been crushed inside of her.
She was done. She was absolutely, totally done. She hadn't signed up for this. She couldn't keep going. She honestly just wanted to die, right then and there. She didn't even know what she was doing anymore. She was a failure. She had completely failed. She had no idea where to go, and she was stuck.
The blonde angel began to cry. She could hardly get the air into her lungs to allow her to do so, but she cried and cried. She couldn't move. She could barely breathe. She was done.
She felt a warm touch on her forehead, then something brushing through her hair. It was comforting in a way, and surprising to Kaitlyn. She managed to open her eyes slowly, and she gazed up in surprise.
Her head rested in the lap of Harmonia, who was gently running her hand through Kaitlyn's dirty curls. The woman's beautiful voice echoed through the cavern as she sang a soft tune. Kaitlyn nearly stopped breathing as she listened to the gorgeous melody. Harmonia's other hand hovered over Kaitlyn's body, golden light emitting from her palm and wreathing itself around the blonde girl's body.
Kaitlyn focused on Harmonia's song and strained to hear the lyrics. Harmonia's voice was high and warbled out of her. The very music seemed to come from the within the goddess, and she practically shimmered while she sang:
"Be still my child,
And hear my praises of thee.
Your life shall lie before you,
And you shall wander free.
Forever you will hear my voice,
And I will wait by door
For you to come home to me
And tell me of this life of yours.
You will never be forgotten,
And you shall always be loved,
So never let the words of others
Keep you from looking above.
While you sleep, may you dream of goodness.
May your friends be forever kind.
And when you visit worlds away,
May I be always on your mind.
For I love you dearly,
Oh daughter of mine.
I will love you forever,
And I will watch you where you shine."
Kaitlyn felt tears come to her eyes once again, but this time from the beauty of Harmonia's song. Her chin trembled and she let out a sigh in order to catch her breath once again. Harmonia brushed away a spare lock of hair and gave Kaitlyn a warm smile, one that Kaitlyn would have described as motherly if she knew what motherly smiles looked like. Harmonia's blue eyes gazed down at Kaitlyn, sharp and piercing, yet gentle. "Don't cry," she whispered, drying away Kaitlyn's tears with her free hand. "I'm here to protect you. I will keep you safe."
Kaitlyn sucked in a breath. "But…but your memories are gone."
Before the last words were even out of Kaitlyn's mouth, the goddess' eyes suddenly went foggy and her kind expression became one that was blank and confused. "What?" she murmured. The golden light was gone, the beautiful melody died, and the cavern became silent.
The angel let out a slow breath and slowly sat up. Harmonia's healing had done surprisingly well. Kaitlyn's ribs, which had probably been broken, were now only vaguely sore. And her scratches and the lump on her head were nonexistent.
A golden light caught her attention. Settled between two rocks nearby, a medium-sized orb sat gleaming. Kaitlyn slowly approached and picked up the glowing apple, holding it up for her to see. The Apple of Discord appeared to be pure gold. It wasn't terribly interesting, but the way it glowed sharply in a nonexistent light made Kaitlyn nervous. It was unnatural, and she wished she was rid of it. But if anything, she needed it.
Kaitlyn let out a regretful sigh and slipped the apple into her jacket pocket. She realized at that moment that she was still wearing her clubbing clothes. She suddenly felt even more unprepared. She had no weapons, an outfit that was terrible for movement, and she had to save the world alone, or at least with the help of a memory-ridden goddess.
At this point, Pit would probably have run his hands through his hair and said, "We've done worse," with a massive grin. Kaitlyn wasn't that confident. She didn't think she had done anything quite so crazy in her life, and her confidence was beginning to drain.
She took a deep breath and started slow. First, she pulled off her high heels and tossed them away. It was better to go barefoot than sprain her ankle on a pair of stilettos. Then she took her skirt and ripped it up until she had easy movement. Of course, this made her outfit look even more immodest, but at least she could move. There probably weren't any men to distract in the caverns anyways, and her jacket did help a little with the coverage. She still had no weapons, but she would manage. She had her fists, and surely those would make a difference.
Though, against a goddess, fists were hardly a weapon.
She gathered her wits about her and grabbed Harmonia's hand and led the goddess behind her. The woman's hand, which had been warm for a moment, was cold and lifeless once again. Kaitlyn felt a knot growing in her throat, which she fiercely tried to swallow down. She felt bad for the goddess. What it must feel like to completely forget who you are, remember for a moment, then be consumed by confusion once again Kaitlyn didn't know. She quickly racked her brain, and found herself able to still remember most things, back as far as she had always been able to remember. That was good, in a sense. She still knew exactly why she was here, and Eris hadn't won yet, which were both good things.
She grabbed the apple and stared at it for a while. She needed to come up with a game plan. Pit usually came up with plans, which Kuro would often flesh out. Kaitlyn had just been the girl who stood in the back with the long range weapons and made calls as she saw them. She was defense. She was the distraction. She was rarely front line.
But now she had no choice.
She paused for a moment. Harmonia stopped behind her and gave her a curious look before glancing around the caverns. Kaitlyn was certain that they were in the Underworld. It only made sense that Eris would make her headquarters in the land of the vilest of gods. But at the same time, she had been imprisoned in the Underworld for a long time. Kaitlyn was a little surprised that she didn't want to leave and set up somewhere else.
Kaitlyn felt her gut twist a little. She had no idea what she was going to find down here. She wished Pit were next to her. He had experience in the Underworld and with Underworld monsters. He would be able to navigate. And Kuro would be able to sense monsters. But they must have landed somewhere else. And even if they had been with her, they had probably both lost all of their memories at this point. They would be no use to her.
The angel looked at Harmonia. "What do you think?" she asked. "Should I go after Eris or Mnemosyne?"
The goddess only gave her a blank look, complete with a tilted head and wide eyes. "What?"
"I guess that really is all you know how to say," Kaitlyn responded with a sigh. "Well, I guess I could go after Eris, but I don't have any weapons at all. And even if I defeat her, I have no idea how to fix anything. If I go after Mnemosyne, I'll have to fight a lot of monsters, but I'll be able to fix everyone's memories, and that means I'll have Pit, Kuro, and Lady Palutena. But…I don't know how to fix the memories. I'm basically useless either way."
She sighed and leaned back on the wall behind her. She let out a groan and rubbed her head. "This is so…hard. How am I supposed to fix anything? I'm not even really an angel! I don't have their magic or their brain, or anything!" She gazed at Harmonia, who still looked confused by the whole situation. "Do you have any idea what it's like to be completely useless compared to everyone around you? I feel like a total failure, and I haven't even done anything yet!"
Kaitlyn shook her head out a little. "But if I don't do anything," she mused slowly, "I guess I won't be able to succeed at all. I'll just be forfeiting the match. That's not like me."
She pulled the Apple of Discord back out of her pocket, and held it up for Harmonia to see. She leveled her gaze and snarled a little. "I'm going to fix this," she said determinedly. "I'm going to go after Mnemosyne first. I'm going to get your memories back, then you're going to fix the apple properly, and then we're going to defeat Eris together. But before that happens, I'm going to leave you here. I can't take you with me. I'm sure you'll find me when you get your memories back. Okay?"
She let go of Harmonia's hand, resisting the urge to say "Stay" as though talking to a dog. But as she was leaving, she felt a tug on her jacket. She turned to find Harmonia gazing deeply into her eyes.
Her words were almost a mumble, and she seemed to be thinking about every word before she said it. "I don't know why, but I think I should give this to you."
She grabbed Kaitlyn's hand and pressed something cold and heavy into Kaitlyn's hand. Kaitlyn looked down curiously, finding a large coin in her palm. It was gold and heavy. The front face was imprinted with Harmonia's face in profile view, and when Kaitlyn flipped it over, she found the other side to be the goddess holding a staff in full body form.
"Your Harmony Coin," Kaitlyn breathed. She looked up into Harmonia's eyes, and nodded. "Thank you." The goddess didn't give her any acknowledgement.
Kaitlyn slipped the coin into the top of her dress until it was snug against her skin in her bust area. She didn't want to lose this, and putting it in her jacket was a surefire way for her to lose it if she made any sudden movements. In her shirt seemed safe.
Slowly, Kaitlyn walked down the corridor, glancing back every once in a while at Harmonia. The goddess didn't follow her, but Kaitlyn felt slightly guilty for leaving the goddess behind. But she knew that the goddess would only be a burden. Harmonia would have the least chance of getting hurt here.
So Kaitlyn squared her shoulders and walked into the darkness of the caverns, hoping desperately that she would be able to find Mnemosyne soon.
After about ten minutes of bumping into walls, Kaitlyn pulled out the Apple of Discord, which let off a golden light, and used it as a flashlight of sorts. She held it in front of her and allowed it to light her path.
The tunnels wound in spirals and split into two at least every thousand feet. Because of this, Kaitlyn had lost her sense of direction long ago. At this point, she wasn't planning on going back, but just the thought of being lost in deep, dark, constricting tunnels for the rest of her time alive made her stomach churn.
Kaitlyn tried to walk as silently as possible, for fear of alerting some nearby monster of her presence. She hadn't seen any monsters yet, but she knew that they were out there somewhere, and she was less than excited about meeting them. So she took long strides and stepped lightly across the ground, carefully making sure no pebble was dislodged. Every time she thought she heard movement, or the odd communicative noises of a monster, she would suck in her breath and hold it for as long as she could. Then she would continue onwards.
She knew she was hopelessly lost, but she touched her chest and whispered a prayer that Harmonia's Harmony Coin would give her enough luck to avoid any monsters and find Mnemosyne. Even with the goddess out of commission, the coin itself was supposed to grant the user luck. So desperately hoped it would work on her.
The blonde angel slowly peered around the next corner, peering into the next large cavern. There were no monsters there, from what she could see, ceiling and floor alike. Slowly, with precision, she walked in.
The monster entered the room just as she did, from the other side. Kaitlyn immediately held her breath and stopped dead in her tracks. It was a Monoeye, and is bumbled alone into the room, having to stay low to avoid the ceiling of the room.
Kaitlyn tried to remember her training. What had Pit said about Monoeyes? They had great eyesight, and could shoot lasers from its massive eye. But like any other eye, it had a weakness. Kaitlyn nearly snapped her fingers as she remembered what she was supposed to do.
The blonde girl slowly edged her way around the room, staying in the shadows. She knew that in a moment, the monster would notice her and she would have to move, so she tried as hard as she could to plan what shew as going to do when it saw her.
Suddenly, the monster turned its body and stared at Kaitlyn. Its single eyelid lowered and its whole body furrowed angrily. Kaitlyn could see its iris begin to glow as it powered up its first shot.
Kaitlyn ran right next to it, on the left side. The eye stared ahead, the glow dying, then span to the side. Kaitlyn moved with it, staying the same relative position relative to the Monoeye. The monster was confused, and span around in circles. Kaitlyn kept as close to the side as possible, in its blind spot. To the Monoeye, it was as though the angel had simply vanished.
Finally, the monster must have come to conclusion that Kaitlyn must have escapes. It span towards the entrance that Kaitlyn had come through, and Kaitlyn shifted until she faced its back. She backed away slowly, tip-toing until she reached the next tunnel, where she breathed a sigh of relief and leaned against the wall for a moment.
Have to keep going, she thought as she continued down the tunnels. She carefully looked around each corner, and backtracked when she needed to so as to avoid monsters. There had to be billions of tunnels in the Underworld, but Kaitlyn was sure that they had to lead to one large cavern, or at least something similar. It was like a large network of sorts.
The angel girl found herself squeezing through tight corridors to avoid the wider ones that the monsters filled. She was glad that she wasn't all that affected by small spaces, or she would have been in serious trouble.
At some point, Kaitlyn had to straight-up crawl through the tunnels. Her knees scraped against the rocky ground. She was sure that at any moment, they would totally give out on her, but she gritted her teeth and kept on crawling.
Suddenly, she saw it: a dull light, one that wasn't coming from the Apple of Discord, which Kaitlyn had set in front of her and would constantly shove ahead of her. She stared, and nearly cried out in relief. She must have been getting close to some sort of end, though if there was light, it could easily be on the surface. That would mean more time crawling through tunnels. But at this point, Kaitlyn was just glad that she was getting somewhere.
She squirmed her way down the passage. Her wings were folded as tightly as possible against her body, but the squeeze was tight enough that the rocks ended up scraping off multiple feathers and scratching through the tender skin underneath. Kaitlyn tried her best to ignore the pain and continued onwards.
The light became brighter as Kaitlyn inched her way through the tight space. She squirmed forwards, her whole body hunched and tight. If this led to some crazy, magically lit up dead end, Kaitlyn was pretty sure she was never going to get out of these tunnels. This was her one chance. She thought of Harmonia and her Harmony Coin and prayed that her luck would improve and she would end up somewhere good.
When Kaitlyn finally came out of the tunnel, she had to stop herself due to the fact that the tunnel's exit was high above the cavern floor. Kaitlyn glanced down briefly and saw the craggy rocks below. She would have to get herself free and fly down, though she would have to wait on that as well, seeing as the cavern was crawling with monsters.
The cavern itself was massive, larger than any of the other caverns that Kaitlyn had passed through combined. It would probably have fit Palutena's Temple, many of the smaller temples, and a handful of the Angel Land houses, and that was a low estimate. The cavern, nearly perfectly circular, had braziers of fire set out at points around its edge, casting the room in a creepy reddish glow. There were four main points of entrance to this main cavern. Each of the entrances to the tunnels was decorated by statues of people holding braziers on either side. The way the place looked made Kaitlyn uncomfortable, but there was no surprise there. It looked like some sort of crazy hell hole, but that made sense.
In the very center of the room was a raise platform, like a stage. Chains rose from this platform, and others hung from the ceiling, holding a figure in between in midair. Kaitlyn squinted her eyes to get a better view of the figure, though she already had a pretty good idea of who it was.
To an outside eye, the person would have seemed like any other preteen girl. She was small and wispy, with thing, twig-like arms and legs. Long, powder-blue hair was done up in a messy ponytail, which fell over her hanging head and spilled over her shoulders. Her dress looked a little worse for wear, being scraped and scratched and torn in various places.
Kaitlyn had lost track of the days. Was she already too late? Was it the seventh day already? No…it had been the night of the fifth day when they went to the bar, so it had to be at least the sixth day. But did time work differently down the Underworld? That was one of the things she hated about the mythological world she had chosen to live in; time was different, and she aged slower now, so anyone she knew on Earth could easily die much earlier than her.
But she was just distracting herself. She knew that the girl was Mnemosyne, and in some ways, she was excited about that. She had found Mnemosyne, which had been her biggest worry before this point, but at the same time, now she wasn't sure where to go from here. Eris wasn't nearby, and Kaitlyn didn't know where any of the other gods were, like Hades or Thanatos. They must have been somewhere else, completely out of it from their memory loss. She didn't want to just jump down there. She would be obliterated by monsters within seconds.
She was still contemplating what to do when the flames from the braziers suddenly flared. Kaitlyn pulled herself back in the darkness of the tunnel slightly and watched as Eris herself strode into the room. She seemed even taller next to the Underworld monsters. The bright light highlighted her cheekbones and eyebrows, giving her an even more regal and sinister look.
She motioned to the monsters that followed her. "Put them on the stage."
Kaitlyn sucked in a breath. The two monsters (Kaitlyn wasn't sure of their species), were dragging an unconscious Pit and a similarly out of it Kuro behind them. They dragged the two angels into the stage under Mnemosyne. Eris stepped up to them slowly, a small smile on her hard face. "This is just getting too easy," she said with a laugh.
The woman snapped her fingers, and immediately two pairs of chains fell from the ceiling. The monsters carefully attached each pair to the angel's arms and another pair that came up from the ground to each of their legs. With another snap from Eris, the chains retracted, pulling Kuro and Pit into the air. Kaitlyn winced a little as their heads hung low, and their backs arched. Their memories were already gone.
Kaitlyn quickly racked her brain, trying hard to remember as much about when she was younger as possible, despite the fact that she usually tried hard to forget her past. But she still had every memory should think of. In some ways, that was a relief. She still had time.
Eris settled herself in the massive throne behind the stage. The throne must have been for Hades at some point; Kaitlyn wasn't sure why there would be any other throne down here. It was huge, must larger than Eris herself, so the throne dwarfed her. The massive chair seemed to be made of black obsidian, which glowed red and orange in places as though it were pulsing with fire. Kaitlyn would have thought the whole thing was pretty cool if she wasn't so terrified of the woman seated on the chair itself.
"Spread out!" Eris called out to the monsters. "Find the last angel, and anyone else in these tunnels, and bring them to me!"
The monsters slowly made their way out of the cavern, leaving only Eris and her three prisoners behind. Kaitlyn was confused for a moment. Could Eris not see her? She had been able to appear to Kaitlyn while she was on the Overworld, and had probably done the same to Pit and Kuro. Did her abilities not work in the Underworld? Or was she trying to get the two of them alone? It seemed stupid, honestly. Why would Eris, who was incredibly smart, want to go one on one with Kaitlyn when she could be rid of her that quickly? Eris seemed to have an agenda; waiting for Kaitlyn would slow her down.
Unless…
Hadn't Nighthawk told her that Eris worked with people's pride? But in order to do that, Eris must have had a lot of pride herself. Maybe it was a matter of pride that Eris was waiting for Kaitlyn. Could Kaitlyn find a way to exploit that?
Or maybe she was actually trying to find Kaitlyn with the monsters.
The blonde angel sighed and relaxed a little. She really had to think about this. She had to find a way to reach Mnemosyne and snap her out of her spell, or wake her up, or something. Actually, she had no idea how to go about this. Nighthawk hadn't mentioned how to fix everyone's memories, just basic information about everyone.
But she had to come up with something. It wasn't as though she could just storm right in. She had no weapons, and hardly any experience. She tried to think about what Pit and Kuro would do. Pit would come up with some elaborate, crazy plan that would somehow work extremely well in the end. Kuro would map everything out strategically and the plan would usually go without a fault. But Kaitlyn wasn't either of them. She was the person who stood in the back with the long range weapons who distracted the enemy, and had constant attacks.
She wasn't good with melee attacks or close combat at all. But without a weapon, she would have to practically wrestle Eris to the ground in she wanted to overpower her, unless, for some reason, she was able to overpower Eris with her wits. Could she outsmart a goddess, though? And how would she go about it? It wasn't as though she could whip out a chess board and challenge the Goddess of Chaos to a chess game.
She nearly pounded her head against the rocks. She seriously had no idea what to do, but she was starting to get desperate. She was just about ready to attack the walls themselves.
She snapped back to attention as Eris stood from the throne and walked to the stage area. Her back faced Kaitlyn, so the angel girl had to twist her head a little to even get a slight view of what Eris was doing. The woman stopped down low and picked up something from the front of the stage. It was large, nearly as large as the woman's long torso. Then, she appeared to split it down the middle.
Kaitlyn suddenly knew what it was: the Codex, Mnemosyne's symbol of power. It was her massive book of words, knowledge, and everything under the sun. Eris flipped through page after page, and Kaitlyn could hear her murmuring to herself. Her voice echoed off the walls of the cavern, though they were completely unintelligible.
The goddess stopped on a certain page, and her fingers ran along the paper. Finally, she seemed to find what she was looking for. She pressed down hard, and…vanished.
Kaitlyn blinked a few times, shaking her head. What had happened? What did she miss? Where had the goddess gone? The book dropped to the ground with a thump, a cloud of dust flying up from the ground upon impact.
Finally, she sucked in a breath, coming to a realization. The Codex was the book of the Goddess of Memories. Did that mean the book itself contained memories too? Had Eris entered into someone's memories?
Kaitlyn glanced around the cavern before she slipped out of the tunnel completely and leapt into the air so she could soar down. Her wings were cramped and tight, but she managed to make it to the ground without injuring herself again.
She rushed over to the Codex and knelt down next to it. The words were written in silver ink, and shone against the parchment paper with a sparkling gleam. Kaitlyn tried to read the words, only to realize with a cry of frustration that they were in Ancient Greek. Dangit…she thought, Why couldn't Lady Palutena have given me an instant fluency in Ancient Greek? The one thing I can never get a hang of!
She gave a sigh and scanned the paper, trying to find something that she knew. After a moment, she actually managed to find something she knew: Πιτ. It said Pit; Kaitlyn had seen Pit's name in Greek enough to know it on sight. She then she saw Kuro's right underneath, spelled out as Κυρω. She knew enough to be able to pronounce it properly. Had Eris entered one of their minds, or both? Could Kaitlyn fix their memories in there? She had to try.
But at the same time, if this was true, she'd be entering ether Pit or Kuro's minds, seeing through their memories. That seemed like such a private thing to do. But she didn't have any other choice. She had to fix this, and she had to get a get an upper-hand over Eris. She knew what she had to do.
She pointed at Kuro's name and held her finger on the silver words. The letters glowed, and before Kaitlyn could take another breath, the scene around her changed, and she was no longer in the cavern.
Writing music has always been difficult for me, because I have very bad rhyming skills, but honestly, Harmonia's song was so easy to write. It just...flowed...
Maybe I'm the only one who's happy about this and who thinks it's good, but I'm proud.
I have a lot of time to write while I'm on break, so I'm actually punching out a few chapters, which is good! I'm pretty sure I know how the whole climax works out, which is good :) It has not been easy, but I've finally got it down!
Anyhow, thanks for reading, as always :) Back to writing!
~Pixie
