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My apologies for such a long hiatus everyone. I lost all motivation to write for a while. I hope it won't happen again, especially so close to the end. Please review and enjoy! Not to pressure you or anything, but the reviews more than anything else keep me writing. Thank you all!

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Bruce and Diana awoke feeling surprisingly well. They of course supposed they had died and gone to some sort of afterlife, but they quickly realized they were still in Gehenna and put those thoughts out of their minds. The next obvious question was how they had not only survived, but had all their wounds healed as well. They sat up and saw the hundreds of beasts they were just fighting dead and strewn across the battlefield.

Half a dozen men in extravagant scale armor moved about the battlefield confirming kills. All six wore clothes of vibrant reds, greens, and blues embroidered with gold under their silvery scale armor that reflected sunlight like the moon. They carried large kite shields that were adorned with the letters 'X' and 'P'. A seventh figure dressed similarly to the rest, but somehow even more beautifully, stepped in front of them. His shield was slung across his back and his gold-hilted sword sheathed on his belt. He stabbed the spear he was carrying into the ground next to him and removed his domed helmet, the chainmail draping from it lifting to reveal his face.

"Stand up."

Diana and Bruce looked at their legs which were only minutes ago completely useless. They stood up, not expecting their legs to be capable of bearing their weight. When they held just fine they looked at the man in front of them in astonishment. They removed their helmets as well, hoping this meeting did not prove as hostile as their last encounter.

Diana's curiosity got the better of her. "Who are you? Why are you here?"

The man answered with a question of his own. "Do you have any food?"

"Yes, I suppose…"

The man sighed. "Your wariness is understandable considering current circumstances, but I can assure you we mean you no harm. If we did, we would not have saved or healed you."

Diana opened her mouth to ask more questions, but the man spoke before she could. "Yes, there are many questions, but the battlefield is not the place."

Diana looked at Bruce. He had definitely not let his guard down yet, but he shrugged in a sort of 'Why not?' "Alright, follow us I suppose."

The man gave a gesture toward his comrades and soon enough everyone had their gear gathered up and were walking east toward Bruce and Diana's homestead. When they arrived Bruce and Diana rushed to get the table outside as there was not enough room for everyone in the cave. They placed the table beneath an oak tree and started arranging whatever seats they could find around it; their chairs, their bench, logs. They brought out a tough bread they had managed to make from some of the local grains and an assortment of fruits. Miraculously, they had been able to find nine "seats", so Bruce and Diana sat off to the side as the table was already more than cramped with seven.

"You seven must be excellent fighters for you to have defeated that host alone." Diana prodded.

The leader raised an eyebrow at her. "That is what you are most suspicious of? Our skill in battle? Not your sudden healing or the presence of other beings after a thousand years in solitude?"

Bruce began to squint at the man. "How do you know how long we've been here?" The emphasis made it clear that even Bruce and Diana themselves did not know.

"Fair enough, I suppose you two have seen many wonders in your lives. And despite your memories being fractured and scattered your first instincts are to size us up; find out our strength, knowledge, and goals."

Diana and Bruce looked at each other, attempting to determine if the man was right about what they were doing. And if he was correct, how he knew more about them than they knew of themselves. Very few conclusions were drawn before the man began to speak again.

"Some explanation is in order that you might trust me, but the circumstances are less than ideal for a full explanation. First, you must recover your memories. As you will not understand much of what I wish to say until you do. Unfortunately, this will be a lengthy process. Since you have lived so long here, your memories of Gehenna will have to be–hm, let's see, digital age…–compressed. They will have to be compressed so that your time here does not appear so long in comparison to the rest of your lives. So, I will send you on a journey to the center of this world and as you walk your memories will shift and resurface until your time here feels like naught but a few months next to your lives before Gehenna."

"You still haven't told us who you are, nor why you have the right to 'send' us anywhere." Bruce found the offer of recovering his memories enticing, but trust was still sorely lacking.

The stranger nodded. "My name is Michael, but my title will mean nothing to you until you remember your past. Before you ask, our reason for this particular time of arrival is two-fold: One, you two were in great need; two, the hour of your departure from this world approaches."

"Who would fight the hordes in our stead should we take you up on this offer?" Diana asked.

"These six." He gestured to his companions. "I have other matters to attend to in other worlds. But I shall meet you at the tree at the center of the world. You'll know it when you see it. You may of course choose to stay here and fight the hordes for the remainder of your time in Gehenna, but I do not recommend it. If you go back to your world without your memories, there will be much sorrow and disorientation. Godspeed."

With that final word the man vanished before their eyes in an instant. Which was incredibly disorienting in its own right. After Bruce and Diana had blinked several times at the disappearance, they were brought back to focus by one of the six soldiers speaking to them.

"Follow this compass, it points to the tree." He placed a round wooden box on the table.

Bruce picked up the box and opened the lid which was latched with a silvery metal and held on by hinges of the same material. Inset in the box was a silver ring that circumscribed a pitch-black void encased in glass. Suspended in the void was a white needle pointing more or less West, where the hordes always came from.

"Won't this lead us through the hordes?" Bruce asked.

"Not exactly. The hordes arise out of the earth some distance from whoever defends your world. You accepted the defense when you accepted the task from someone called The Gentle Man a thousand years ago. Say the word and we will take up your vigil; the hordes will not bother you once you are several miles away."

This brought a new question to Diana's mind. "How far is the tree?"

"Far. You will only arrive when you are ready. Maybe days, maybe weeks, maybe years."

Diana and Bruce looked at each other. They saw concern in each other's eyes, but also hope and the weariness of a thousand years. The decision was obvious.

"Our vigil is now yours." Diana said as she turned back to face the six.

"Very well. Do not rush your journey, you will have the time you need, and haste will weigh at your ankles like chains. Leave your weapons and armor; the only enemy you will find is yourself. Take only the necessities. Sleep. Eat. Drink. Walk. Rest. Your bones will ache, your throats will dry, your mind will burn as it heals, but you must continue."

They nodded and went to prepare. Inside their house they prepared bags with only the bare necessities. When they had finished, they sat on their bed and sighed.

"How are you feeling about all this, Bruce?"

"Not great. It seems stupid to leave weapons behind. We still don't know who these people are. We may find ourselves to have been completely different people in our lost memories. Who knows if the world we came from is any better than this one? But…I don't really feel like there's much of a choice."

Diana sighed again and flopped backwards onto the bed. "Yeah, me too. Even if it is a few years of pain though, it will be a drop in the bucket compared to what we've been through."

"That's what I keep telling myself. Strange that it isn't very comforting." Bruce stood up and offered a hand to Diana to help her up. "Come on. I figure we should put distance between us and the hordes during the night, so we don't have to evade them during the day."

She yawned and Bruce smirked; her hair was going every which way on the bed and her face was all distorted by the yawn. Oh how he loved her. She took his hand and stood up.

"Alright then, let's go. Before I fall asleep with you smirking at me." She smiled coyly and put on her cloak.

They waved to the warriors that had taken their place as they left, wondering where they would sleep. The moon crept across the sky, no longer a crescent like it had been for hundreds of years, but a nearly-half illuminated sphere. Luckily, the moon was bright enough and the compass needle reflective enough that they could always check their bearings. At first, they felt naked without their armaments; but they soon adjusted and felt peace knowing that the fighting was several miles behind them. And better yet, there was no fighting in the foreseeable future.

A few hours before sunrise they pitched their tent and collapsed inside, exhausted and dreading the light so near at hand. It was slightly chilly, but they were warm in each other's arms.

They awoke in the early morning and groaned as they sat up, wishing for something to keep the Sun out. Thankfully, the night was longer here, so they had still gotten around five hours of sleep. Their muscles ached from the poor sleep as they broke camp. They walked all day, eating a snack at lunchtime and only breaking for supper. The terrain was becoming more dramatic, each hill a little taller and steeper. Their legs were not appreciative.

"What do you think he meant when he said, 'You'll only reach the tree when you're ready.'?" Diana asked after a couple hours of silence.

"I've been thinking about that too…The only thing I can figure is that this journey is dependent on our psychological state. How though? I don't know." They began trekking up a particularly large hill.

"Well. You know how the only way we were able to remember that there were other people somewhere was that the monsters seemed tied to the terrible actions of others?"
"And sometimes our own actions, yeah."

The two had learned rather quickly that if they had a fight or were rude to each other, there would be a beast with their names on it the next day, and usually it would be massive.

Diana continued. "Maybe people's actions can have an impact on this world, just like they have an impact on the hordes. Maybe by being in the wrong mental state we can add a few miles just like we can add monsters to the hordes."

"Maybe. I don't like it, but it makes a strange sort of sense."

They crested the hill and groaned within themselves. Directly in their path, in the distance, mountain peaks stretched across the horizon. That meant their journey the next day would be nothing but winding through the mountains, hoping to find a path through.

"Maybe our proverbial, mental mountains can become physical ones too." Bruce scoffed.

"Let's hope not, you might keep us here a while." Diana chuckled.

"Ha! If it weren't for you I wouldn't have so many mountains."

Diana elbowed Bruce while smiling. "Hey!"

Bruce threw his hands up in the air. "Turn about's fair play."

She put her left arm around his waist, so he lowered his arms, his right hand falling on her shoulder. They took a step forward together and were both simultaneously struck by a headache. Dizziness overtook them and balance escaped them. On his knees a faint picture of a manor estate appeared in Bruce's mind, an island in Diana's. The memories were as sun-faded oil paintings, without distinct lines or forms, just blotches of familiar colors. As the dizziness and dull pain receded, they looked at each other and immediately knew the same thing had happened to both of them.

"It's working." They both said, a little surprise in their voices.

The pair stood up and began running forward, attempting to hold the images in their minds as they did. Upon cresting the next hill, they noticed that the images had become sharper, better defined, more vivid. They stopped for a moment, breathing heavily.

"It's a sunny day," Bruce began. "There are colorful leaves on the ground, it's Fall." He looked around as if he was standing in the midst of the memory. "The stone steps to…to my home, they look so big. Ah! There's blood on my hand. I fell. There are three people standing at the top of the steps. Who are they? I need to get closer." But try as he might, that was all there was to the memory.

"I was riding a white horse bareback on a beach. I could hear the muffled thud of the hooves as they hit the sand. I could smell the sea and feel the wind. There was a group of people that I was riding towards, but their faces were hidden from me." Diana began to walk briskly. "We have to keep going."

Need sped their feet, and they walked far longer than they should have into the night, but the mountains stood stubbornly, seemingly just as far away. After a while Bruce doubled over exhausted and laughing.

"What?" Diana asked, somewhat peeved that he was holding them up.

"'Haste will weigh at your ankles like chains.'"

"Damn it! Is that why this has been so tiring? Some childish test of our patience? Fine. We'll camp here for the night then."

"Good idea."

The two dreamt of nearly dying over and over again. They tossed and turned as fights and tragedies played out in their imaginations. They woke up with headaches and drenched in sweat. The nightmares slipped away from them as the morning wore on. Some things stayed with them, but without context there was nothing they could actually understand. They forced themselves to walk at a normal pace and as they did the mountains seemed to draw closer almost too quickly. Before they knew it, their journey became almost exclusively a vertical one.

This time, Diana stopped them. "I can see their faces now. They're all women…the Amazons. And that one…that's my mother!"

Diana urged the horse on across the beach, her small, child's hands gripping the horse's mane. Her mother and her sister Amazons turned to see her coming. The Amazons repositioned their horses to block her view of something on the beach and her mother rode her horse toward young Diana.

"Diana, go back home."

"Why, mother?"

"We're doing business that isn't appropriate for a child. Now run along."

"But I don't want to, mother."

"Diana. Do as you're told." Hippolyta gave her a stern look.

Diana sighed. "Fine."

She turned her horse to go, but looked back to find out if she could see anything. A limp hand lying on the beach was just barely visible between the feet of one of her sisters. She thought nothing of it, but it gave her a strange feeling of discomfort.

"Bruce, my mother…her name is Hippolyta. I know who my mother is!" She hugged Bruce tightly, forgetting about the hand and focusing on her revelation.

Bruce returned the hug and as he did the word 'mother' echoed in his mind.

"Mother! Mother! I fell and cut my hand!" Tears rolled down the boy's face.

Martha raced down the steps toward her son, her heels clicking on the stone. Her husband and their butler followed casually behind her.

"It's okay, mommy's got you."

"I'll go fetch some bandages, ma'am."

"Thank you, Alfred."

Martha took the boy's hand in hers and chupsed at the sight of the gash in his palm.

"Alright, Bruce. Let's get you inside so we can wash the wound before Alfred gets back with the bandages." Martha started to lead her son up the steps.

"Let me see." Thomas bent down and took his son's hand. "Ah, you'll be alright, that will heal in no time." He took the handkerchief out of his jacket pocket and wiped up his son's tears. "Until then, remember this: Pain is just a message from our body saying we're in danger, and if we know that we aren't in danger…we can tell the pain to be quiet."

Bruce sniffled and nodded, refusing to cry anymore.

Thomas smiled and stood up. "That's my boy."

"Thomas!" Martha hit her husband on the chest.

"What? That's a valuable lesson."

"I know who my parents are too. Thomas and Martha."

Diana backed away slightly, grabbing Bruce's shoulders. "That's wonderful!" But Bruce did not return the excitement or the happiness in kind. "Bruce, what's wrong?"

"I don't know. There's happiness in remembering them, but something also feels wrong, heavy."

Concern crossed Diana's face, but she decided to stay optimistic. "Well. Let's go. I'm sure it will all make sense in the end."

"Yeah."