Between Worlds

[Caliban]

"Between Worlds"

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I'm back home. The home I've built on Planet Manhattan (bought, actually). A private place to hold my beloved Valkyrie. A mansion...made in the most perfect way (in every way) there is. Beautifully furnished in a rustic design that takes me back to my humble beginnings. His humble beginnings. Everything is so quiet - no voices, no rush, no need to throw myself in the face of danger over and over again over scraps in order to achieve an almost impossible task. I'm leaned against my other half. The missing half of my heart. Despite everything that took place. The rocky road we've been through and the awkward times we've talked. Yeah, we're here now. No more running involved. I know who I am and she knows, too. Who I am, who I...used to be. She looks back at me. Her eyes like two crystals. A smile to brighten my own gloomy face.

She's my light.

In the blink of an eye her smile flattens. She leaves my side and enters the living room. Seems weird, is all...we watch from the balcony as the sun settles, and then she leaves. I wait for her. Complete silence. Minutes pass. I grow restless, almost nervous. I shrug it off and speak her name. There is no answer. I stop leaning on the balcony and enter the living room. I take a left turn just around the corner to see nothing. She's not there. Matter of fact, nothing is there. Everything's gone as if it never existed in the first place. I turn around. I see nothing. Everything disappears.

It all comes back to me now.

To me, years passed. And they did. By now I've lived lifetimes in just a few months. This was just another one of them. Perfection given shape within the realm of my mind as I drift asleep. She's not real, my rest isn't real and - all of it gone in the blink of an eye. My eyes open and...he's looking back at me. Taunting me with his eyes, almost. He jokes about my predicament. Of course he does.

You fell asleep again. Were it not for that daunting helmet I would say you even smiled."

My heart's burning. Of course I'm angry again. Why would I be anything else other than an angry freak? I should already be ignoring those jests. It ain't the first time he does them.

I straighten myself on the pilot seat. I think I was drooling behind the breathing apparatus, but I could not be bothered to check. Two clicks - I fastened the safety belts. There was only green smog surrounding my ship, and the navigation systems were all scrambled, regurgitating something about "spatial impossibility", "linear continuity invalid" and "arithmetical equations exceed solvable parameters". There were other, weirder gibberish paragraphs the console spat out. These were only the ones that I could pronounce with a clear voice - and remember.

I boot my ship's engines. Let them hum for a while. Warm up and everything. I didn't want to risk (a lot) in trying to find a way out of this place out of sheer recklessness. While that happened, I still had him watching me from the corner of the cockpit. Sometimes there, sometimes just floating outside, refusing to break eye contact. A neutral face with no expression. Was this another, poor joke? Who cracks up laughing first or something?

Moments like these make me wish I just flew ahead with full throttle.

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"Test the sharpness of your sword against another. And when that is not enough, unsheathe your cunning as the hidden dagger that ends the fight."

Prospero's Folly - - - Character Information