My wings scraped across the low ceiling of the tunnel. As much as I wanted to wear my cloak for warmth, the stream from the base was still going down the passageway and wetting our feet, so I held onto it. Nothing is worse than wet clothes. …Actually there're a lot of things that are worse but that's not the case in point.
Every moment I had, I thought about Mewtwo. He seemed to know a lot more than what he told me and I hoped I could meet him soon. If Samus's claim is true, then he was one of the people who became a phantom after I crossed the Mirror for the first time. He said the cult, or the Martyrs caught him and they turned him into a phantom.
As much as I dislike them, I really don't know a lot about this group. They're not our allies, for sure, but we are after the same thing. They seek the truth and the significance to this cave, and probably a means to survive. A man called Father Sutherland leads them; he is Priscilla's father and probably Dr. Sutherland's son. All of the human residents of this cave I've met so far are supposedly dead. Are the Martyrs alive or dead?
What real proof do I have that I'm alive?
"Duck!" Toon Link called out.
I snapped to attention, only to crash into the bump jutting out from the ceiling. My vision spun in circles and the scratches I made earlier stung as I keeled over. Samus, who was behind me, caught my fall.
"Ooh, that sounded bad." Toon squeezed by Meta Knight to come look at my head.
"Yep, I'm fine." I replied, but my voice sounded loopy and unconvincing.
Meta Knight was the only one looking past the tunnel. He raised his hand for us to be quiet. The stream following the tunnel led into the darkness ahead. I had to hold in my breath to alleviate the aching in my forehead, which made my senses perk up even more.
The stream sounded different in the distance. Gurgling and clinking, like something was in the way. The object seemed solid and immobile. Samus slowly raised her searchlight to the tunnel and almost immediately, a golden reflection shined into our eyes.
Toon was the first to trot up to the reflection. As we all gathered closer, we saw it was another figurine on a golden plate. He was on his side, blocking the stream and making the water trickle down its sides. I touched the base and hugged the newcomer as he revived before he could say how scared he was.
"Oh!" Luigi piped, his voice squeezed out from my hug.
"Thanks for waiting for me, Luigi." I said.
Luigi was a bit speechless from the sudden circle of friends. He did flinch upon finding Samus, but Meta Knight intervened.
"Samus is revived as well, thanks to Pit." He reassured, patting Luigi's scrunched shoulders. Luigi then finally dropped his tight stance sighed a big breath of relief.
"I'm sorry Samus, I thought you were still…" He trailed off.
"No worries. I apologize as well. But I'm good as new now, thanks to our leader." Samus smiled.
I watched my friends exchange banter and felt a new sense of guidance. Until now, the friends I've met were as lost as I am but we helped each other get through. I didn't want to believe it, but there was a certain tension between the others and Samus, as she turned into a phantom while I was gone.
There were some conflict between my friends and me at times. Especially with Roy, I've fought with him on multiple accounts but he's basically my better half. Plus, I literally have the power to help my friends. I don't feel it but I am more powerful than I was when I started out.
"That's wonderful!" Luigi clapped his hands together.
"What is?" I asked. I zoned out of the conversation.
Luigi turned to me with expectant eyes. "You have the… the things! The elements, um, substances! Can I see them?"
I understood pretty quick. Samus, Toon, and Meta Knight were thrilled that I have the ink and the light at my disposal when I met them as well. Luigi clapped again when the substances swirled off of my hands. His eyes were twinkling with joy as he got a front row view of my magic show.
"Yes, now that you're back, we can go save my bro!" Luigi exclaimed.
I cut off the substances and faced him. "Your brother, Mario? Is he…?"
"Oh. Yes, he…"
We fell silent as Luigi looked down, twiddling his fingers and trying to find words. Meta Knight seemed to understand as he stepped up to explain: "Mario went with you to the Hell's Gate side. But shortly after, he alone returned, or perhaps an entity that took his form returned. He attacked us, saying that you failed and disappeared along the way. That's when we all were separated."
Toon seemed to nod, Samus kept quiet, and Luigi mumbled another 'yes'. No wonder a lot of my friends lost faith in me.
Phantoms do talk a lot of cynical and toxic chatter and I don't trust them; but that's because, sadly, I'm used to it. But if I was in Luigi or in anyone else's shoes, I just disappeared and if an evil entity in the form of my friend came back and said I failed and died, I probably would have believed it.
I rambled. The silence was too uncomfortable. "I was with Dr. Mario and some others right before I came here… he did say he was being chased by something. He was in a city called Polis 1 and I helped revive him. But I didn't know he had a second phantom."
Luigi spoke up. "Yes, doctor or not, both are my same bro. Now, I think half of him came back, and his doctor self stayed with Pit. …You did say that the Mirror is odd."
"I guess so… Well, there are a couple Links like Toon here, so I'm not surprised there are many Marios as well. There might be a some 'me's too." I said.
"Well, the best news is that you came back with the substances. You did it!" Luigi laced his fingers together and smiled a mile wide.
I smiled back but I couldn't really match his excitement because I didn't feel like 'I did it' quite yet. But maybe he meant it as in I stepped on a major milestone. In which case, I did agree.
As we followed down the passageway, I asked my friends if they knew anything of the others that are scattered. Luigi only knew about his brother before he became a statue, and Toon and Meta Knight were together until they became statues as well.
Samus, who was now leading the way with her bright searchlight illuminating the tunnel, told more of her story.
"Several days after your group crossed over, Mewtwo eventually became the de facto leader of our group. He had similar talents and insights like you do with the light and the ink and whatnot so we all looked up to him. We deduced some of us can use the stuff but not all of us could."
"Is that why we split up in two groups, one with me and one with Mewtwo?" I added.
"That's correct. And you know of the cult, right?" Samus answered.
"I do. And that we're not supposed to say their name."
She continued. "…That is correct as well. They've been hostile with us, especially to you and Mewtwo because of your abilities and knowledge, I assume, so we tried to stick together. It didn't work at times and we were forced to take shelter and hide, like the cove we were just at."
If the Martyrs were the same people as Blackwood in Polis 1, they're twisted and misguided as he was, but I feel like we could've done more than run and hide. When Mewtwo and I went fishing for food from their stash, he did an awful lot of sneaking around, despite him being a powerful psychic fighter. Although he did say he was captured by them somehow.
"We didn't, like, fight back against them?" I asked.
Surprisingly, Toon was the one to answer. "If they were like Bokoblins, I would fight too, but you said we shouldn't fight them. You said they're just people that are scared like us."
"I said that?"
Samus chimed in again, "You did, but after you were gone, they became more aggressive so we wanted to fight back. Mewtwo was the one who stopped us because he said to us and the cult that you'd be back with answers for everyone. …You know what happened to him then."
"Mewtwo got caught by them, and turned into a phantom." I nodded.
"It happened so fast, and we were all shocked to do anything. It was then that Mario, or his phantom, I guess, appeared to tell us that you were dead along with everyone else in your group. Mewtwo changed, drove us all in different directions, and we were all scattered."
"That about sums up everything. I think a lot of time passed from then, but then I met you!" Luigi patted my back. I had a rounded stance so I straightened it a bit.
"Thanks." I said.
I felt bad for Mewtwo. He really is a kind person… well, individual. It's not right that he worked so hard in keeping the peace while I left and it didn't pay off in the end. And I even acted like his hard work didn't pay off. Well, in my defense, I really didn't remember anything, but I just wanted to give him a big hug. Hell, I wanted to give everyone a big hug.
But Samus cut off my thought process. She called me calmly but also with urgency.
"Pit."
Luigi, Toon, Meta Knight, and I all huddled around Samus in the narrow passageway. Another foreign light reflected back from Samus's searchlight. The gurgling sound of water was louder now, and the tunnel's slope growing steeper.
"What do you see?" I whispered.
"I hear something." She replied.
I felt Luigi tense behind me. He must have already heard something odd, so I closed my eyes and concentrated. Water, wet ground, echoes. The tunnel deposited into another bigger room. Judging Samus and Luigi, we shouldn't make any rash moves yet.
It was weird, my friends heard something odd, but I smelled something weird. Under the offensive sulfurous smell and humidity, I smelled flowers and the wind.
And then, there was the sound. A faint voice. "Pit,"
"Did you hear that?" Toon asked. Everyone nodded.
"Let's go." I said, slipping through my friends as quietly as I could.
Samus must have dimmed her searchlight because the end of the tunnel seemed to glow. It was a soft, warm light compared to Samus's. It looked like sunlight but we were travelling down this passageway so that made no sense. Luigi had a hand on my back, quietly urging me to go further.
Upon reaching closer to the light, I felt more and more drowsy. It was such a pleasant light but I rubbed my eyes and kept advancing. If there was anything that I fell for one too many times, is "the light at the end of the tunnel". I wasn't going to fall for it again.
Or so I hoped.
It was a door, already ajar to the room. My room. The small bed, the unused and empty desk, and the closet with my books and personal effects looked so real. It had most of my different colored togas. The yellow one, my favorite, was laying across the floor.
Sunlight spilled from the big window facing me, the strong smell of flowers from the front yard made my vision spin like I stood up too fast. I looked behind me and none of my friends were there. I didn't hear it creak but the door was closed shut. I've kind of expected that to happen and that wasn't half as surprising as the person sitting in front of me.
He was sitting at the window sill, looking out into the afternoon sun. He wore a black toga, missing from my closet, and his black wings were shimmering blue and green in the sunlight. In my head, I was comparing this scene with the times I've faced the Mother, when I turned into a phantom in Polis 1, and when I crossed the Mirror: dark, ominous, as if the world was doused in black paint.
Unlike those times, I felt a sense of ease in this room, and with him.
"I can't believe you forgot about me." He said. He had my voice, maybe a little lower.
"I think I know you." I said. It probably wasn't the smartest thing to say but I could see that he nodded slightly.
"Yeah, and I think I know you too," he continued, "You keep using that 'I forgot' card when something happens. Did you ever think that you were misguided? Did you ever have a shred of doubt that something you believe is wrong? Why did you assume that the Martyrs are in the wrong?"
The reason popped up immediately. They hurt my friends. Why would I stop to think that they are misguided or not? Do I need to show mercy again like I did to Blackwood in Polis 1, only to realize that every person in this cave is already dead?
"Because…"
He cut me off. "But it's not a tricky puzzle anymore, Pit. You have the answers in your hands. You can make it through this. Just please stop saying that 'you forgot'. You never forgot anything; they took it away from you."
When he turned to face me, I felt the room was starting to fall apart. The floor beneath me sifted through into the darkness again and I fell, but I got a good look at his face.
It was me. In the black toga and black wings. He had red eyes but they looked so humane. He didn't look doused in ink or some deity borrowing my appearance. He looked like an individual, free from any odd influence of the cave. Maybe like a brother, almost. And he stared at me with a certain determination like he was reassuring me.
His words resonated in my ears: I have the answers in my hands.
Hands wrapped around my neck.
I woke up to a figure pinning me onto the limestone floor. He grabbed my neck and was pushing down on me so my wings were strained against the yellow rock. I coughed, squinting from the light peering through the phantom's teeth. The light was that sickly white light, not like the warm sunlight I saw at the end of the tunnel.
"Sweet dreams?" The phantom sneered. I quickly noticed it was Mario from his trademark hat and mustache. He is smaller than me but being placed in this situation, I didn't have much in my power to fight back.
Luigi grabbed his brother's shoulders and tried to pry him off of me. His green hat was gone and an ugly bruise on his cheek was making one of his eyes close shut. Samus, Toon, and Meta Knight were nowhere in sight.
"Wake up, bro! We're going to be okay!" Luigi shouted. He struggled, but lifted him off enough to give me a breath.
I finally snapped out of my daydream and brought my hands up to Mario's face. A dark substance swirled off my hands and began to eat at the light spilling from his mouth. Mario's phantom screamed, scraping at Luigi's arms but Luigi held onto him tight.
I remembered Samus's story, this is the phantom that broke off from Dr. Mario and told my friends on this side that I died. He was basically the trigger that caused everyone here to scatter.
Luigi held onto him tight and my ink would help rid him any moment but, I felt the need to have an audience with him.
"Luigi, let go." I said.
"What?" Luigi exclaimed. "Please, just save him!"
"Now!"
Luigi bit his lips and let go of the phantom. I turned over to my right as Mario's phantom lost balance, now me pinning him down on the rocky floor. I placed my hand over his face. Luigi stared at the both of us, unable to move or even blink, anxiously waiting for what happens next.
I felt my breath quiver holding him down. The phantom seemed very docile now despite him screaming his head off from my ink eating away his light not even seconds earlier. It was almost disturbing, like the idea of death to the phantom was insignificant.
"You were the one who told everyone I was dead." I managed to say.
The phantom was silent. Now, with his mouth shut, it really just looked like Mario. Only his eyes seemed feral and somewhat unstable.
"I can disintegrate you any second now." I pressed.
In the corner of my eyes, I saw Luigi shift uncomfortably. I still couldn't guess where the rest of the group was but at least Mario's phantom seemed to be the only threat now. I looked back at the phantom to see he was smiling at me.
"Then you're using the wrong hand." The phantom replied. Every time he spoke I had to squint from the sharp rays of light peering from his mouth.
He grabbed my left hand and brought it to his chest. I probably shouldn't be listening to him at all. Who knows if Mario's phantom had any powers like Dr. Mario's phantom had? I didn't have any reason to think that he'll be compliant enough to answer my questions anyway. Yet I found myself frozen in place as the phantom spoke again:
"The crazy left hand destroys, the dominant master hand gives."
My left hand twitched, making my fingers scrunch up and bend backwards. Some force was pulling my hand away from the phantom like each of my fingers were controlled by a puppet master.
"You cannot defy me. I created you. You will never escape." The phantom's voice had a certain weight that made me realize it's a different person speaking now.
"Pit…" Luigi groaned.
I nodded to Luigi to reassure him.
The dream I had this morning, when I 'woke up' and found fake-Link in that tunnel, and the day before when Mewtwo and I were separated, there was a "whiteout" and I was sort of reset to a certain time like nothing had happened; the two events matched together. In both times I was conscious that I was deliberately being placed in a different time and place as I had experienced.
The blackouts that separated my friends and I in the other dimension, it feels like essentially the same thing, yet it's the opposite effect. I later on deduced that it's the actions of the phantoms like Roy and Young Link, and they connect back to the deity behind the curtains and chains, The Mother. So the "whiteouts" here should be caused by another one.
"You're the other deity."
As I said that, the word Mewtwo said not to use, the phantom's smile disappeared. His body dispersed, or more of shimmered into another form. Mario's phantom changed into the child when it first approached me before I fought Young Link's phantom.
"You're just as selfish and pathetic as those humans. You grab me by my neck and tell me I'm evil. You call me a blasphemer and a liar. I told you some truths are meant to be hidden."
"You did lie to me." I said.
He shifted forms again. Now it was the girl with the long brown hair and the blue sundress, when it approached me again when the ink took over me in Polis 1. A flawless white carnation was placed above its ear.
"White phantom. The light, hope in physical form. The ink, despair in physical form. Seek the truth or escape from it. Your fatal flaw of the thought of being murdered and murdering someone took control of you. What lies did I tell you?"
The fingers in my left hand cracked from all that twitching. I still couldn't regain control of it yet.
I knew the answers. I have them, had them, in my hands from the very beginning. I didn't forget my name, I didn't forget that I needed to eat and drink, I didn't forget some of my friends when I met them again, I didn't forget why I was in this cave. Slowly but surely, everything was coming back to me.
The two deities that reside here, they took it away from me.
"Everything. Everything you told me was a lie!" I roared.
The invisible strings that seemed to hold back my left hand snapped, and I literally slammed it down into the deity's face. The black ink exploded from my hand like a broken fire hydrant as the young girl's face contorted in pain. A hideous wail lasted for about two seconds, and a block of light fled from its mouth. The figure shimmered again, revealing Mario.
His unconscious body lifted from the impact, and when the wailing stopped, Mario too seemed like his strings snapped off as he fell. Luckily I caught him before he could hit his head on the hard limestone floor.
I was tapping Mario's back unconsciously, then I noticed it was my left hand that struck the deity and it was actually shivering. My mind went blank from the whole situation. Not only I attacked a phantom, I'm used to fighting them, but I actually defied and struck a deity being. My throat shriveled up from that sudden shout and from the sensation that felt like a different part of me was angry. Like a previous, before-my-memories-were-taken part of me was reaching out to current me. And they were merging together more and more.
Luigi was there again, supporting me and Mario as we both breathed heavily. I looked up, and while he did smile back, I did catch a glimpse of fear in his eyes upon me looking back at him.
I asked before the moment changed, "Luigi, what did you see?"
It took a couple gulps and breaths before he could answer me. "You were angry at my brother's monster, and the monster changed into a boy and then a girl. You used your substances and helped Mario."
I felt myself dropping all of the tension in my face and shoulders. I wasn't alone in this, Luigi saw it too.
"Did I scare you?" I asked, my voice faint.
"A bit, yes, but you were determined and I can't thank you enough for saving my bro, Pit." Luigi choked on his words.
He laughed, trying to make light of the situation, but tears were already forming in his eyes. I wanted to think he was relieved too.
I reached my left hand out to Luigi's bruised cheek. He didn't flinch or hesitate as he let me touch his closed eye. Swirling purple gas shrouded that portion of his face. Luigi smiled, closing his other eye and leaned his head toward my hand as the bruised lifted off his cheek. I slowly removed my hand, not surprised that the ink inside me healed Luigi's injuries as the light did for my friends before.
"Pit! Luigi!"
Multiple voices and footsteps quickly approached us. Below us, in a rather steep slope, was Samus, Toon Link, and Meta Knight climbing up to meet us. All were dirtied and injured, save for one new friend: Princess Peach, in her heels and dress. She was climbing up the rock slope faster than the rest of the group with gleaming resolve in her eyes. She didn't seem mad but I was intimidated anyway.
When she made it to the top where we were, not even the slightest bit out of breath or her adornments disturbed, she immediately crouched and gave Luigi and I big hugs and kisses on our foreheads.
"I knew you were going to make it back, Pit. So nice to see you again." Peach cooed as she pinched my cheeks.
Then, she pulled out her frying pan.
Luigi knew what might happen next. "Oh! Wait, princess, no!"
I winced as a soft but resonating metallic clang echoed in the room. Mario moaned and rubbed his head.
"Oh." Luigi peeped. "I thought you were going to hit Mario harder."
Peach giggled joyously, "Luigi, you don't take me for a violent kind, would you? Well, good morning, Mario."
"O-Of course not, princess! And good morning bro! Guess who saved you!" Luigi squeezed his brother in a tight embrace as Mario finally fluttered his eyes open.
Mario said his loopy greetings. And as he finally came to, he saw me and gave an even bigger hug than Peach gave me. Samus, Toon, and Meta Knight finally came up to us, a bit out of breath, so we all sat down on the base of the limestone hill.
Samus explained the group was separated from me when I slipped into that dream of my room, and fended off Mario's phantom while I was unconscious. Then they found Peach's statue and the phantom changed its target to me, hence I woke up being choked by an evil entity.
"Are you okay, Pit?" Mario asked, putting a hand over my forehead and checking at my injuries. The way he did it reminded me of Dr. Mario back at the factory behind Polis 1, except he wasn't wearing a white coat and didn't have a stethoscope.
"I'm fine. So, you are, Dr. Mario? Like you are the same person?" I asked. Probably a dumb question but nonetheless, it was important. To me, at least.
"Uh, duh." Toon answered behind me. I saw Samus smacking his head lightly.
Mario smiled. "Yes, Dr. Mario and I are the same person. I just change clothes unlike Toon and Link. A bit confusing, I understand."
"But a part of you stayed here, while your doctor part came with me to the other dimension, right? How does that work?" I asked more.
Mario and I noticed the rest of the group sat in a circle now, listening to us intently. With me, being the other leader that disappeared into another dimension, and Mario, a friend possessed by an evil entity that told everyone here that I got lost and died, it was understandable to be wanting to hear our side of the story.
He cleared his throat. "Well, I did join you when we ventured across the Mirror. But I got lost along the way and The Mother chased after me with its chains and barbed wire. I don't know if I spent days like that, but that doctor…" He trailed off.
"Dr. Sutherland?" I guessed. Mario snapped his fingers in approval.
"Yes, Dr. Sutherland. He found me and took care of me in that Polis 1 place. He told me of his family, and told me of The Mother that chased me down. And then… I don't remember much from then. I can remember you, Pit, helping me in that prison where we met again. It's odd, I can remember more now than before."
"Me too. And that's a great thing." I agreed. "So, when Dr. Sutherland talked to you about his family, did he say any names?"
Samus placed a hand on my shoulder. Mario made a nervous glance to Samus and nodded. I forgot to heed Mewtwo's warning of not saying the names out loud.
"Mewtwo told me of the danger of saying certain words here, but I can't hide them. Especially after what happened with you and what I just fought." I said, wording my sentences carefully.
Mario thought for a moment, but shook his head. "I don't want to take risks if we can avoid them. I'm sorry Pit, after I remembered what happened with Mewtwo getting caught, I…"
The others started to feel uneasy as well. Maybe I was taking things too fast. I rummaged through my pack and pulled out the half-shredded notebook and pen and handed it to Mario. He looked puzzled so I explained: "Mewtwo told me they're 'blinded by written language', so I'm assuming writing is okay. Can you write down Dr. Sutherland's granddaughter's name?"
He nodded quietly, as if he's scared of saying something by accident. I watched the paper intently as he wrote and confirmed my knowledge.
Mario wrote out, "Priscilla", in neat but small writing.
"Pit," Mario whispered, staring down at the notebook. "Remember when I was a phantom as my doctor self, I woke up from your help and asked if I murdered any of the people in that city?"
It was a faint memory already, but I did remember. In Polis 1, Dr. Sutherland told me Dr. Mario's phantom killed all the nurses and patients in the hospital where he was tended at. I never knew the truth since that hospital was long since abandoned, but I reassured Dr. Mario that it wasn't his doing.
"I remember." I replied.
"And then, we both realized, the people were never alive in the first place."
"Yes." I whispered.
The image of the empty Polis 1 still gave me chills. Seeing the city so alive with so many people and lights and smells, then, in an instant, gone. Along with all of my friends that I met again. I don't think I've ever felt so lost than when Dr. Mario and I were sleeping in that dilapidated train in the aftermath.
Mario pointed to Priscilla's name in the notebook. "Did that happen with this girl too?"
I dug through my head. Polis 3, the necropolis, the abandoned city, and the only girl that stayed there. Her family and everybody else left her because she could use the light and her father despised it. I would never forget the first time I used the light to stop Lucario from turning into a phantom. When we left the place, I offered her to come with us, but she stayed behind again. And we found out she was already dead as well.
"I didn't know she was dead first, just like Polis 1." I replied.
And then we all fell silent. I've been thinking about the human residents and their alive or dead selves for a while. Everyone except for our huge group of friends have been dead. Maybe that's why the Martyrs seem so elusive compared to The Mother and the deity that I just punched in the face.
Mario shook his head again. "My head is jumbling up. Never mind."
"Well, as before, all we need to do now is stick together and gather everyone." Toon piped up. "We can think of the confusing parts later."
"Wonderful idea, Toon. I was just about to get a headache from thinking too hard!" Luigi tittered.
I closed my tattered notebook and placed it in my bag again. I was glad to find the blue cloak folded tightly in the bag next to the soup cans. It was a nice reminder of Roy when he stole it for me in Polis 1.
Mario stood by me as we started down the limestone slope again. It was kind of pleasant to see Toon, Luigi, and Meta Knight exchange their banter as they stumbled down the steep slope. Peach hummed as she gracefully skipped down. I saw Samus staying with the group; I wondered why since she could turn into a ball and roll down the slope but I assumed that it was for all of us to stick together as Toon said.
"If I confused you and the other guys, I'm sorry. I just want to make some sense. I don't know what happened to R.O.B., Mr. Game and Watch, and Falco back at the factory… I don't feel good being here when I left the others behind." Mario rambled.
"Worrying isn't your nature, doc." I said.
"I'm not a doctor right now…" He mumbled as he tried to hide a smile.
"Of course, because you are 'Mario' in this dimension. But your doctor self is still behind the Mirror." I explained, patting my brown pack. "This pack and its contents are all gifts from our friends in the other dimension, and I still have it here. Just having it hang over me helps me realize that when I get separated from you and everyone here now, I have this to prove my friends actually exist, and that this is not some sort of a dream."
Mario looked up at me with a different light in his eyes. "I'm glad you're our leader, Pit."
"Thanks."
Our group was big now. Not as big as we were back in Polis 1, but it felt like a big group as we trotted down the unpaved paths. As we took a break near a shallow green lake, I opened my notebook to write down the names of the group members now, and Mewtwo, when we meet again.
I flipped through the pages. Most of the clues seem obsolete now. The third entry, with the phrase 'I hate my name' written from the top to bottom made me terrified when I first laid eyes on it. At first, I thought I wrote this entry. It still did look like my handwriting. It was the first time I realized the familiarity I felt with this cave that I might be reliving the same experience. But I was never backtracking the memories that I wanted to forget.
Staring at the piece of paper didn't help me remember. Perhaps I did write it. I was always uncomfortable with my name. I've spent days thinking of alternative names for myself but nothing felt right. I was always going to be Pit.
Despite the gaping hole in the middle, the writing on the back was still legible: 'the entrance is an oxymoron'.
I turned to the last page. A detailed sketch of me hugging my knees and holding a black feather, along with a foreign font: 'you're the heaven's door'. I was never an artist. Nor would I ever draw myself; I'm rather confident with myself but I'm not that narcissistic. I guess I never really thought of who might be writing these entries that I've collected. Some seem so elusive that I didn't even have a clue.
The black feather I was holding in the sketch seemed more innocuous now.
'you're the heaven's door'
I am the Heaven's Door?
I flipped through again, then landed on a piece of reference paper. It took me a bit to remember where I got this from. Priscilla, the girl in Polis 3, gave me this as a parting gift. Her father's reference notes of some strange symbols in the cave. Lucario touched on the feather symbol and he was almost overtaken by the ink. The feather meant 'savior', I guess. I thought the symbols were like an ancient curse, and Roy and I spent time thinking of how we turn into phantoms.
Maybe that's still counterintuitive, why would the 'savior' symbol trigger the ink? It seems like a trap than anything. Was I overthinking this again? Were the elusive things as clear as looking through glass?
I looked up. Mario was peering into the green lake with Peach.
I defied the deity. He told me Lucario turned into a phantom because his curiosity got the best of him. Which was wrong, if I stay true to my word from earlier. Then my flaw isn't murder either. What triggered me to turn into a phantom?
My hands were emitting the two substances. Light in my right hand, ink from my left hand. Both can hurt and heal us. Both are neither good or evil. They maintain a balance between the two dimensions of this cave. They are the substances of the two deities. If I defied the deity, I defy his words as well.
The light isn't hope, and the ink isn't despair.
"As clear as looking through glass." I muttered.
When Dr. Mario's phantom hovered over me in the prison cell of Polis 1, he gave me his arrogant brag as all the phantoms do. He said there was a reoccurring theme to all of this. Remembering and forgetting. I can only have one or the other. As I remember more I get closer to the truth, but further into the depths of this cave. As I forget more, I get closer to the sunlight. …Okay, that might not make sense.
Think simpler.
The blackouts took my friends into different parts of the cave. The whiteouts forced me into another time and space.
The ink usually paints over my friends and I, taking our humanity away and replaces with another demonic presence. The light usually eats the inside of my friends and almost poses as the original person, although it fails miserably because of its evil personality.
When I gained audience with The Mother, the deity with the ink, let's say, it kept saying that I won't be able to escape its grasp as long as I don't remember. The child deity, the deity with the light, I guess, offered me false clues and appeared helpful. Me, being the gullible person I am, believed its every word. But that's all in the past.
In simpler terms: the ink takes away, and the light gives.
So, if I have both of them, what does that make me?
Author's Note: Happy Holidays! I have the ending mapped out so hopefully this story is starting to make its way toward the end. As always, thank you for favoriting, following, and reviewing. I am always open for any questions.