CXXII
The Five Inversions, Part One
Bruce Wayne watched from the ground below as his wife flew into the distance, to visit the first of the Inversions, to the dance of light and shadow with the strong, gravitational pull that had amazed him with its shining splendor. It wasn't this Goddess he was worried about…
Back on his feet again, he felt uncomfortable standing on rocks barefoot and naked. He had grown far too accustomed to custom-made Italian leather shoes. Bruce decided his best course of action was to carefully walk over to the place where they had hastily abandoned their clothes as they had indulged in one another.
In the distance, he could just make out Raven… 'conversing' with the first Goddess. If he was going to be any use to her, he would at least need his shoes back on. This wasn't the type of terrain you could run across in bare feet - thousands of sharp, edged rocks jutted from the landscape amidst blowing sands.
After a careful stroll, he slipped his dusty clothes and shoes back on, and realized he felt tired. So much had happened to them so quickly… His world had been turned upside down and now, standing upon the planet where sentient life had first been born, it all seemed so far away. Even more, there was a mental weariness that constantly wore upon him – this place could snap your perception of reality in an instance if you let it.
Perhaps Trigon may not have known what the Inversions truly were, but he knew that Bruce would not have lasted long here. Without Raven's intervention, he shivered to think what would have happened to his mind with the fifth Goddess. He gathered Raven's items as well. Although he enjoyed the sight of his wife naked in whichever color she chose to appear, there was no telling when they might be suddenly popped into another place… He reminded himself to bring a backpack for all the teleportation they had done lately.
As soon as he finished dressing, the Acting President felt the familiar, firm grip of the white-gloved hand upon his shoulder once more. Without even turning around - or displaying a hint of surprise - Bruce heaved a sigh and addressed the Stranger behind him.
"It was nice of you to wait until I got dressed. People would start to wonder…"
"The robes of human flesh do not concern me, Bruce Wayne – only the soul that dwells within." And yet, the Phantom Stranger had still not removed his hand from his shoulder.
"Then quit staring at my wife."
"I… Ahem… I have come to warn you of forces that are conspiring even now to extinguish all known existence. The Great Beast engages the Darkness."
"Uh yeah… Did you know about this place, Stranger?"
"I had heard the legends, but I did not know the truth… until now. Order may never be absolute, else it becomes tyranny. What has been done here, even in the name of order, is wrong. Gods will not be made into slaves. The price is too high."
"So what do you plan to do about it?"
"I will do nothing. There is another who shall call these names at the time of the second coming. Existence itself shall hang upon a single word which shall invoke the power of Gods to tip the scales towards order or chaos, life or death."
"You talk in metaphor a lot... Do you realize that? Anyways, while we're waiting, maybe you could help me figure something out…. I'm wondering why Trigon didn't just kill me after I attacked him. I broke the covenant barrier between myself and the God of Revenge. I gave him the license to use his full power on me… So why did he send me here unharmed?"
"Because to kill you would also mean his daughter's demise, Bruce Wayne. Your destinies are now as one. When Raven entered into the pact with her father, she was gifted the use the Silver Needle of Fate to draw her own blood. She wove her Fate to your own thread by blood magic. By overcoming the three temptations of Trigon, your threads have now become irrevocably entwined. There is no force in existence that can keep you apart, in life or in death…"
"She… That's… really comforting actually."
"Too many metaphors?..."
"No, that was fine… Nice job. So what are these forces you spoke of conspiring to extinguish all existence and the Great Beast in the Darkness and all that?"
"You were never meant to be Raven's intended."
"So I've been told. But, here we are, man and wife."
"On the day she was born, her father promised her to another. When twenty-one years had passed, she was to be delivered to him, and their contract finally sealed, a Fate worse than any that ever could be imagined, Bruce Wayne."
"But Raven was exiled from Azarath on the eve of her twenty-first birthday…"
"Yes… In her own way, I believe Azar acted to protect Raven. I cannot say the degree of familiarity the matriarch possessed regarding this horrific matter of matrimony, but the suspicious timing of Raven's exile does beg the question.
But whether by design or providence, Azar banished Raven to your world in the proverbial nick of time, well aware that faith and love had placed a very strong soul barrier around it, protecting the Earth from such things as Trigon… and her betrothed."
"But who is this other suitor, Stranger?! Who is it that Raven was promised to?..."
"Trigon's recent actions have drawn me towards a conclusion I had feared to allow myself to admit… But the Great Beast has shown there exists no path he dare not tread, no darkness he will not embrace."
"And?..."
"It is Nekron. Lord of the Unliving…. I am sorry, Bruce Wayne."
With the revelations of Metron now known to her, and Bruce back safely on the ground, Raven Wayne flew across the sky to the first Inversion. She wasn't normally such a confident flyer, but the magic in this place made it incredibly easy. She had never realized that her ability to levitate was magic-based, but it was.
As she approached her destination, she beheld a being of alternating light and darkness - affixed to the cruel cross of the Guardians. This first Goddess had an incredibly strong pull upon her body, like waves of gravitational force ebbing and flowing, drawing upon her in sporadic tugs.
Raven allowed herself to be pulled towards the Goddess, as if she were being carried upon an invisible tide. In her heart she felt… love? Mysterious currents pulled her closer as a chorus of harmonious female voices exalted her arrival in the air around them, peaking in beautiful crescendos to match her journey on these strange waves.
The Goddess took form.
A beautiful woman composed of nothing more than moonlight with long, flowing hair of silvery gossamer. Her long, ethereal hair concealed her eyes, hidden in the shadows of moon beams, but did not conceal her inviting smile. There was something incredibly sensuous about her… mysterious. Her beguiling smile showed a secret that you longed to know… a secret that was waiting just for you.
Raven knew who this was!
"Selene…"
Whatever celestial mysteries she chose to drape herself in, Raven knew beyond any shadow of doubt that this was the Goddess of the Moon, the Mistress of Secrets… Selene. The Goddess's smile broadened as Raven spoke her name - an ocean of pure love washed over her –flowing across the invisible waves from the captive Goddess. A lost daughter, now found.
Raven placed a gentle hand upon the silvery cheek of the Goddess of Moonlight and Mystery. She spoke her silent respects before traveling to the second Goddess.
"I will find the way… somehow."
As Raven continued her journey, she soon understood that the second Goddess was power. Not just the power that filled the air and land around, but also the power within her, making her feel amazingly strong in her spirit, reassured by everything. It was at her beck and call. There was magic here, beyond any she had known before…
As Raven approached the second deity, the Inversion suddenly came into focus and took a single form... a familiar woman, with curly, black hair… just like her mother's, surrounded by three torches that floated around her. Her soft features were revealed only by the torchlight so that no other light could reach her but her own. Raven suppressed a gasp and stopped for a moment when she beheld the entirety of the Goddess… a two-hundred-foot tall Arella.
Her mother was known to this Goddess.
Under the Goddess's pale skin, Raven watched what appeared to be massive dark serpents… coiling and flowing, weaving strange patterns just under her pallid flesh, traveling from her extremities towards her middle until they formed a massive, entwined ball of vibrating darkness.
This deity did not project emotions. Raven was not awash with feelings as she had been with Selene… instead she felt its sway within her. It was as if she had become the Goddess. If Raven were to choose a direction, a path, she would be granted power beyond her wildest dreams. She need only embrace her own abilities and the Goddess would worship her. It was an incredibly empowering and strange sensation…
"Hecate."
It had surprised Raven when she spoke the name... Hecate, the Goddess of Magic, Witches and Crossroads seemed different than her classical description, but then again, she could have chosen to appear as anything. She could be maiden, mother or crone. In this aspect, she had chosen mother, taking on the appearance of her own mother.
Of course! As a practitioner of magic, Hecate would have known who her mother was… the mother she still held within her. Raven watched as the figure on the crucifix changed, now transforming into a giant Azar.
"I will believe in myself, Goddess." With the wise face of Azar, Hecate smiled at her as Raven smiled confidently back, taking her leave.
The third Goddess was an infinity of thread…
More threads than Raven could ever hope to count. Billions of threads… Spinning and writhing to form a galaxy of shifting lines and patterns before her wondrous, amber eyes. As the crimson demigod approached closer, these infinite strands of color seemed to stitch and weave themselves into a massive, two-dimensional wall before her, creating a spectacular tapestry of enormous dimensions…
Within seconds, she witnessed the completed masterwork – a fabricated image stitched over three hundred feet high and one hundred and fifty feet wide; its bottom hovering just above the ground. It was as though she were suddenly facing a tapestry as big as a football field, forcing her to pause, looking up-and-down, side-to-side, just to take it all in.
(Even as large as it was, a billion loose ends still coiled and writhed behind the veil, out of her sight.)
She marveled at the final, entwined image; an elder, winged woman, proudly holding a staff. But this was not a static image. The image was being consistently rewoven to simulate movement… Patterns were re-stitched to create shifting shadows upon the immense weave.
Raven gazed as embroidered eyes followed her own while massive, stitched wings fluttered in the breeze. Twin serpents coiled themselves around her staff of fabric, continually slithering upwards, their scales shimmering in a thousand colors of shifting thread.
The woman in the weave was re-sewn, so that her hand was now remade. The index finger on the image's right hand became raised, so that it was now revealed to Raven to appear as if the Goddess had stretched out her finger towards her. The daughter of Trigon suddenly peered at her own index finger, which still bore the small pinprick where she had pierced it with Verdandi's silver needle, only brief hours before. To save the Earth, she has made a binding pact with the Fates themselves…
And to her eternal salvation, it had been a gamble Bruce had won.
Flying forwards, Raven extended her own index finger, placing it upon the proffered fingertip of the Goddess. The instant she touched this strange fabric, an electric wave of love and excitement blasted through her, making her suddenly retract her own finger hastily away. She had never felt emotion like this, unbelievably powerful…
Raven watched as a smaller image was now being woven into the fabric in front of her, next to the hand of the Goddess where she had touched. She recognized the newly fabricated figure as the kind Norn who had offered her the use the silver Needle of Fate… Verdandi.
"Yes… it was Verdandi who allowed me to use her Needle and make this pinprick."
The background of the tapestry instantly changed to pure sunshine, almost blinding her… it was as though the Source itself had now replaced the weave outside the Goddess. Raven glided backwards, shielding her eyes from the immense radiance as her vision slowly recovered.
She now beheld the Goddess as a younger woman holding three infant daughters… all nestled snugly into her cradling arms. Large wings shielded the three sleeping infants from the glaring light of the Source shining in the weave behind her, as the triplets slumbered peacefully in her arms.
"You're their… mother?"
Raven had to think about this for a moment… Metron had told them that the imprisonment of the third Goddess had allowed the Maltusians to move outside of the confines of Fate, so that nothing was inevitable for them. The sixth God had also called her one of the oldest Gods… And now she had shown herself to be the mother of the Fates themselves… The Mother of Fate… The compelling will of the Universe…
"Ananke!"
Merciful Mother! The Maltusians had no idea of the consequences they had ventured… They were attempting to supplant the divine will of the Universe with their own! With her mouth agape in shock, Raven addressed the Mother of Fate.
"It will be set right, Goddess. I promise you..."
A sewn smile spread across the lips of the third Goddess, as one billion threads once again unraveled from below, the tapestry dispersing back into the coiling strands of Fate itself, yet still captured upon the cross. Metron had spoken true… the blue-skinned Guardians had placed themselves above the Gods.
How could she forgive them? Although the Maltusians had suffered a great tragedy under the last of the Old Gods, that could never justify what they had done here. Enslavement was nothing more than a tyrant's mortgage, paid with the interest of revenge. And none were more tragic than the remaining two Goddesses...