With untethered Black, Athira reached for Reader's mindscape.
It was dangerous — stupid, even — to use her Colour without keeping it directly linked to her body. It was too easy to slip and drown in it when Rathe clawed at her thoughts — but for the first time in years, he was absent. The Colour was hers and hers alone, and after how close she'd come to disaster, she was done wasting time with games.
Every nerve was alight and screaming as she located the link between Reader's mind and body. Her Colour always hurt to use, but this... this was past her limits. It burned, like the Black that flooded her system wasn't Colour but wildfire, incinerating every last inch of her until she was nothing more than a charred, empty husk.
Athira tightened her grip on Reader's hair to steady herself.
A charred husk maybe, but not empty. Not yet. Not when there was still that one, last piece of her left that refused to burn.
With a breath, Athira pushed deeper, her Black snaking its way down the link to Reader's mindscape until finally, she found it.
His mind rippled with a quiet, eerie hum that followed no tune. It was an iridescent maze of violet that had long since shattered, fractured, and warped back on itself into a controlled, careful kind of madness. The whole thing was razor sharp and had little respect for the concept of up and down.
"I'm waiting, Athira," said Reader, his violet gaze locked on hers. "Really, whenever you're ready." The words echoed through his mind, chased by a thought that ricocheted off the gleaming walls of the maze. Perhaps I was wrong. The thought bounced away, leaving behind a glimmering trail. Such potential wasted by a tragic lack of will.
A smirk curved its way onto Athira's mouth as her feet drifted off the ground, her hand pulling back Reader's head until his throat was bared to her snarl. "I lack nothing."
The Black flooded into Reader's mindscape.
Her Colour devoured the gleaming trail, chasing down the thought and swamping it, tearing it apart to search the disappointment, the doubt, the fixation that had birthed it. Suspicion flared through Reader's mindscape, paired with something else — something that Athira could only describe as panic as his eyes went wide and the maze of his mindscape pulled shut.
Athira laughed, sighed, and sent even more Black to besiege the iridescent fortress.
The Black pushed into the cracks of the now interlocking walls, forcing them apart. Pieces bent. Others snapped. She hardly cared which, because either way, she'd rip his mindscape apart until she had what she needed.
Reader fought her — or at least, he was trying. Flickers of Purple jolted through his mindscape, immediately consumed by the Black. He twisted and reared against the tendrils that bound his body. His mindscape continued to retreat. The walls pulled tighter, the hum grew louder and more discordant, but there was nothing he could do to stop the inevitable.
A thought skittered past, trapped by the Black. Shouldn't be capable of this. Shouldn't be possible — but ah, the excitement! The potential! The —
"Yield, Reader," said Athira, tilting her head to examine him. His breathing was heavier, his eyes were unfocused, like it was taking every scrap of concentration he had to even attempt to resist what she considered a gentle push. "Yield, and I might leave you with enough sanity to still be useful."
"Sanity, you say?" Reader's gaze slid to hers, slow and dazed. "Sanity, sanity, oh to understand the minds of men, to embrace the truths of this world, such a mortal concept must be left behind."
"I don't want to hear your deluded ramblings right now," said Athira, slamming another wave of Black into his mind. Something new snapped. His eyes lost focus. "Where do I find the Wardens?"
A wild, split shred of thought bounced through Reader's head, too erratic, too unpredictable to catch. Wardens, Wardens, where to find them indeed? Everywhere, everywhere indeed, which means only one place! Yes, yes, one place that makes sense for everywhere. "With Colour like yours, I'd be surprised had they not found you already, my dear."
Athira pushed deeper into the maze.
The closer she drew to the centre, the more cracks appeared. The Black wedged its way into everything it found and broke them open, leaving memories and thoughts once stashed in dark corners spilling out into the maze, replaying upon the broken, gleaming shards that lay strewn about the mindscape.
The flicker of fire. The desperate words of a promise to never speak of what he'd seen. The agony in his mouth, the blood that dripped from it, the words he could no longer form.
Another wave of Black.
The heat as his face was forced closer to the fire, the scream that didn't need a tongue to rip from his throat.
Another piece cracked.
The silence.
The stillness.
The truth he'd missed before.
Everything began to blend together. A hundred memories split a thousand ways through, so fractured and detached that they were little more than a cacophony of noise, too tangled to even begin to make sense of. His insanity was a far greater defence than any wall, but among it all, flickers of clarity still existed.
Can't know. Not yet. Too soon. If the Wardens stop Rathe — no, no. The true Kingdom shall come to pass. Always comes to pass, through one sovereign or another.
With little but ruin behind her, Athira reached the heart of the maze.
"Last chance, Reader," she said. "Yield or break."
"I sacrifice myself to the Kingdom," said Reader, a fanatical edge to the thoughts that twined with his rambling words. "I sacrifice myself to the freedom of all, to the Kingdom, to —"
Athira rolled her eyes. "How about the peace and quiet of the universe?"
She rallied her Black around the final, inner sanctum of Reader's mindscape and prepared for the blow that would shatter its defences when a new, yet achingly familiar voice called out.
"Athira?"
Athira's mind went blank.
Even if she'd been prepared, if she'd known who was about to enter the room, Athira couldn't have stopped herself from turning to look at Zoe.
Her earlier glimpse of Zoe in the training room was seared into her brain. Athira still wasn't entirely convinced she hadn't imagined it, but Zoe was right there, right now, standing in the doorway. The yellow of her Keeper suit was bright in the dim light of the stairwell. Her platinum blonde hair was in the same high ponytail it'd sat in when they were fourteen, only now it was longer, and bound with an indigo ribbon.
Athira just stared.
Zoe was alive.
It hadn't been a lie.
She hadn't imagined her.
A smile broke out onto Zoe's face. Her glow intensified as she started towards them. "Thira!"
Athira couldn't make herself move as one thought spiralled through her head.
Snuff out the light.
Reader chuckled from where he knelt on the ground. "The Owl seems far more reluctant with an audience, I see."
Athira's attention snapped back to him. While she still held his head, her grasp on his mind had slipped — and not only that, so had the thin layer covering her hand that protected her from Reader's mental probing.
A dark night. Lethargy in her bones. A girl with a white-blonde ponytail, dragging her forward — her sister, screaming at her to move. The splash of water. A last, defiant stand. The icicle buried in her neck and the muddied, golden chain still around it despite the blood, the rage—
Reader's eyes gleamed with Purple. "And with such a high cost for failure, too. You'd think one would be less distracted when Rathe wants that 'one, last piece' finally destro—"
The tendrils around Reader tightened, cutting him off and leaving him gasping for air. Athira jerked back his head. She shoved her Black back into his mindscape, far rougher than before. There were no more chances. Just one, last blow that should have been her first.
Before she could strike, Zoe was beside her.
Zoe grabbed Athira's arm and pulled her away from Reader. "What in the hues are you doing, Thira?"
Athira tore her gaze away from Zoe, trying to concentrate on Reader. She didn't need direct contact to get into his mindscape, but she did need to be focused. "What needs to be done."
Athira reached out a hand, loose flecks of Black drifting from her fingers. Zoe grabbed her wrist, shoving it down. Athira attempted to shake her off, but Zoe just held on tighter, forcing Athira to face her.
"Thira!" said Zoe, her forest green eyes filled with far too much worry for someone like Athira. "Talk to me! What are you doing?"
"What I have to," hissed Athira. She was vaguely aware of a blunt nausea in the back of her throat that marked an oncoming Surge, but she hardly noticed. The Black no longer burned. It flowed through her, smooth and unrestrained, misting off her skin. "He knows something. He had his chance to tell me."
"Whatever he knows, it's not worth killing him over!"
Athira's gaze slid to Reader, on his hands and knees, forehead against the ground, chest heaving. A choice between him or Zoe. That's what he'd given her. "Yes, it is."
Zoe hesitated, glancing at the runes blazing along Athira's arms. "Your runes — is this the monster again, like in the training room?" Yellow light flared at her hands. "If it is, I can —"
"This isn't the monster's influence," said Athira. "This is entirely my decision."
"I don't understand, Thira," said Zoe, her fingers squeezing Athira's. "Why on Thols would you need to —"
"I'm doing this for you," said Athira, not quite able to pull herself away. "For everyone on this damned rock of a planet, because I'm out of other options. If Reader wants to be a stubborn idiot, fine. He'll break, along with everyone else who wants to stand against me."
In spite of everything, Athira found herself with a small, desperate hope that Zoe might understand. That she might still trust her enough to believe in her, to stay on her side when the rest of the world was against them.
Instead, Zoe's mouth set into a hard line.
"If you kill him like this," Zoe said quietly, "you'll be standing against me, too."
Athira pulled her hand from Zoe's.
The sting of the words she'd known would come quickly drowned beneath the flooding Black.
"Thira," began Zoe. "Don't —"
"Sorry, Zo," said Athira, rising into the air, up and out of reach. "But I'd rather you hate me than watch you die again."
"Thira!" called Zoe. "Thira, come down!"
Athira blocked it out and turned her attention back to Reader.
No longer hunched on the floor, Reader had grabbed the Colourless kid and was running for one of the empty windows. Grapple gun in hand, he fired, locking onto the wall above the window that promised freedom.
Athira reached a hand above her.
A huge, Black dome spread into existence, plunging towards the ground and severing Reader's grapple line. Momentum slammed him into it. The kid he held dropped and slipped beneath the wall of the dome before it hit the floor, but Reader was left trapped inside.
Athira coalesced the misty Black around her into a tendril, looping it around one of Reader's legs and dragged him back towards her. "Leaving so soon?"
From the ground, Zoe fired a laser directly at Athira, who blocked it with Black. Even in Athira's darkest moments, Zoe's light had always cut through Rathe's roars — the rage, the anger — but this time, there was no monster to silence.
The confirmation hardened her resolve.
After a second laser that was also blocked with little effect, Zoe's attention went elsewhere. She swore and ran to the edge of the dome — towards where the kid had gone — sparing half a glance at Reader as he was pulled past her and into the air.
Athira hated herself for the small, lingering ache as she watched Zoe turn away from her.
"I'm impressed, Athira!" said Reader, manic as ever despite being dangled upside down. The tendril swelled, engulfing his torso and restraining his arms. "I'd thought Zoe would surely shake you, but I see now you are far beyond what I'd anticipated. I'd be willing to share —"
Athira lifted a hand, palm up, Black misting from her skin.
Pain was a foreign concept, buried beneath the sheer exhilaration of her Colour — exactly like it always should have been. She'd always been so cautious, so careful to contain her Black, to prevent Rathe from using it against her, but if she'd wielded this against Rathe from the beginning — this power, this flood — she'd have obliterated him the moment he dared to even breathe in the direction of her mindscape.
Athira smirked. "You're the one who wanted me to show you, remember?"
Her hand closed into a fist.
The Black plunged into the depths of Reader's mind. He bombarded her with every jagged, jarring thought he had, desperate to disorient her, to dissuade her. She smashed through it all, sank her claws of Black into the walls of his mindscape's heart, and began to rip it apart.
Whispers of Rathe and Wardens lurked inside, growing louder with each piece she tore away. People. Places. Other memories she didn't yet have context for, but soon would. A few were familiar, but it was the memory of a half-built skyscraper consumed by Black, shimmering with an almost daydream-like quality that gleamed brightest inside — no doubt the result of her fight with Rathe, had she lost.
Her grip tightened on Reader, causing him to inhale sharply.
She had lost, and it was entirely thanks to him.
At least after today, she'd never have to worry about Reader's interference again.
With this Colour, she'd never have to worry about anyone again.
Reader's head lolled; his maroon hair plastered against his face with sweat.
Athira pulled him close enough to make sure her voice would echo through his hollowing mindscape. "Am I capable enough yet, Reader?"
Reader cackled to himself as his head lolled back. "Ahh, so close to the edge, little Owl." His eyes were bright with madness, with what she'd done to his mind. "So unready, so unprepared for the truth, the truth of aaaaaaall your little —"
"Athira! Drop the shield!"
Athira's gaze flicked down.
Zoe stood inside the wall of the dome, opposite of Shift on the outside who had the Colourless kid in an awkward hold. Not all of the boy had made it through. His legs, while still attached, hadn't made it outside. He wasn't moving.
"Didn't you hear me?" said Zoe, slamming a Yellow-lit fist into the wall of Black. Shift pressed a white-glowing hand to the dome as Zoe continued. "Drop the shield! There's a boy caught halfway and he's not —"
Athira returned her gaze to Reader. "Not until I'm done."
"Reader's half dead!" yelled Zoe, furious. "Where do you think he's going?"
"With the shield up, maybe about ten metres — assuming he can crawl that far."
Zoe stepped away from the dome and strode towards her. "What's the point of stopping one monster if it just makes another one, Thira?"
"Who said I wasn't one already?" said Athira, though her attention snagged on Zoe as she pulled something small out from the collar of her Keeper suit.
Zoe held the glinting, golden object up as close to Athira as the chain would allow. "And what about this? Does this mean nothing to you anymore?"
It'd been far too easy to disregard any fleeting concern for the kid, but the sight of the locket had Athira's stomach in knots. She smirked in her best attempt to ignore it. "I'm the Owl now, Zoe. Or didn't they tell you?"
Zoe stopped, her confusion all too clear.
The heart of the mindscape's maze was wide open, eaten away by the Black. Atop a small, eccentric pedestal — where Athira could only assume Reader's conscious thoughts collected — a memory blazed.
It was the same vision as before. The half-built skyscraper devoured by Black, only now, it was clearer. It flickered between realities. Most where the Black consumed the building, and everything nearby it, and one where the Black receded, leaving a soft, Yellow glow emanating from within.
Athira paused. She'd assumed the vision was of earlier, the result had she failed against Rathe, but the Yellow was unmistakably Zoe's. She hadn't been here earlier, and other details weren't adding up.
The vision flickered again, showing a Keeper's rover pulling up outside the Black-consumed building. A sandy-haired Keeper in a Green suit ran into the building a few seconds before it vanished into a yawning void, taking him along with it.
One slip, sang a shredded sliver of Reader's thoughts as it twirled by. One oops, too far, deleted it all, gone, gone, gone. Call the light, bring them here, perhaps, perhaps, perhaps...
Her Black was doing more than just breaking his mindscape — it was devouring it. It wasn't uncommon for her Black to erase things in the physical world when her control slipped, but Reader's mindscape wasn't just a random piece of furniture. Replacing him — or rather, the answers he had — would be irritating.
Then again, she didn't need answers if the next time Rathe showed up, she simply blasted him into oblivion.
"Th — Thira, please!"
The strange, pained note in Zoe's voice snatched Athira's attention away from her musings.
The air was thick with a heavy, Black fog. It swarmed inside the dome, clinging to everything and anything it touched — and Zoe, who stood directly below her, clutching her arm, was no exception.
The misting Black clung to Zoe's hair, to her suit, to her hand firmly wrapped around the locket. More than a few locks of white-blonde hair were on the ground as the Black slowly gnawed away at her. Brief flashes of Yellow kept it somewhat at bay, but there was skin showing through small holes in her suit — holes that were speckled with blood.
The sight cracked Athira's smirk.
I did that.
Thira? Talon's voice sounded distant, like there was a thousand tonnes of water between them. Thira, can you hear me? The Surge is peaking. I don't know if I can hold back this amount of Colour when it does.
She could feel it, the flood behind the dam wall. To use this much Black, she'd opened the floodgates. If they were still open when the Surge peaked, there was a good chance the wall might just break, and at that point, there was nothing that would stop her Black from erasing everything in a ten-block radius.
The vision hadn't been her fight with Rathe.
It was now.
Athira's senses broke through the drowning Black as she crystallised it. The nausea at the back of her throat that announced an impending Surge sank straight down to her stomach. Reader dropped, caught by Zoe below as she quickly cuffed him. The dome cracked next, raining thin, obsidian shards across the concrete floor. Shift pulled the kid free, shielding him with his body.
I've almost got it sealed, said Talon, his attention entirely focused on the Black. Hold it back for as long as you can, I'll —
More Black rushed in from her mindscape, continuing to mist off her skin and add to the ever-growing haze. Athira tried to coalesce the fog, to draw it away from Zoe and crystallise it, but for every chunk she crystallised, there was twice as much to take its place.
It won't hold, said Talon, his worry all too loud. You have about a minute to get as high as you can and hope we're far enough away when it peaks.
Athira had no idea what would happen to Zoe if she left the mist behind and vanished off into the sky, whether the vision was caused by unsupervised Black or her own inability to control her Colour. All she knew was that at Starpoint, she'd contained her rampaging Colour — and that right now, it was her only option.
She drew the misted Black into her body and slammed the floodgates of her mindscape shut.
Athira dropped from the air with a muted, strangled scream. She barely felt the impact as her ankle twisted the wrong way and her knees slammed into the concrete, utterly consumed by the waves of searing fire that swept through her body. Inside her mindscape, the tide of Black rose, pressing against her will as it beckoned her back below the murky depths where euphoria waited. She couldn't hear Talon, couldn't hear anything except a dull ringing in her ears, and —
"Thira?"
Zoe was in front of her, kneeling among the obsidian shards.
This close, Athira could see exactly what kind of damage her Black had done. Though only smooth, unmarked skin showed through the holes in Zoe's suit, the yellow fabric was stained with bright, fresh blood that told a different story. Even now, blood ran down her face, dripping off her chin.
"Thira, you okay?"
"I... I hurt you," said Athira, her voice scratchy.
Zoe gave her a lopsided smile and reached for Athira's ankle. "I can handle a little bit of pain, y'know." She pulled Athira's ankle straight. "You aren't the only one whose Colour heals them anymore. Figured that out the night you left."
Athira's gaze caught on the heart-shaped locket hanging from Zoe's neck. The sunflower engraving on it was worn but clear. "You kept it."
Zoe glanced down. "Of course I did. Remember what you said when you gave it to me? That if I wore it, I'd always have a piece of you with me, and that now I could finally—"
"—Finally stop stealing mine," said Athira, reaching for her own amulet. "I didn't think—"
Another wave of Black blanked out Athira's head. She hunched over, fingernails raking down her arms in an attempt to remind herself that there was something, anything outside it.
"What's wrong?" said Zoe, placing a hand on Athira's shoulder. "How can I help?"
Athira grit her teeth. "You can't. Just leave. Forget about me."
"Forget about you?" said Zoe. "You think I can just forget about you? Raph named this whole damned team after the colour of that cloak you always used to wear, hoping that one day you'd —"
"Give up, little light," said Reader in a sing-song voice. His eyes locked on Athira's, glittering with half-snapped sanity. He cackled. "She's gone, plummeted, plunged! Not even the Spectrum could save her now."
Athira tensed at the new word. Spectrum. The Black swelled, sensing her desire to scour his mind for an answer when Zoe grabbed her wrists.
"No," said Zoe. "Ignore him. You're too smart to get baited by a power-tripping nutcase like Reader."
Athira bared her teeth. "Is it a bait if he's not smart enough to stop?"
"I don't understand, Thira," said Zoe. "What on Thols pushed you to the point where you thought this was a good idea?"
In spite of everything — the pain slashing through her nerves, the nausea that made her want to hurl up her liquid insides — Athira found laughter bubbling up her throat.
"It's not," said Athira, the corner of her mouth tweaking up the slightest bit. "It was arguably worse than the time Raph tried to dry out a chilli in the microwave when he was twelve." She sucked in a shuddering breath as the full weight of the Surge bore down on her. "It's... it's just the only option I have left."
The Surge peaked, and this time, Athira couldn't stop the scream. She wrapped her arms around her waist, trying to hold herself together, to gasp for air and somehow stay afloat above the agony that pounded through every part of her existence — every part except for a small, charred sliver that'd refused to burn.
A part that now glowed as Zoe leaned forward and pulled Athira into a hug.
"You aren't out of options," murmured Zoe, right beside Athira's ear.
Pain still swept through her. The Black still raged through her mindscape and body, boiling her alive from the inside out.
But when Zoe squeezed Athira a little tighter, oblivious to the heat radiating off Athira's skin, the world became nothing but the feeling of Zoe's arms around her.
"You have us," said Zoe as a soft, Yellow light engulfed them. Tears lurked in the corner of Athira's eyes — though from the pain or something else, she could no longer tell. "And no matter what happens, Thira, you'll always have me."
*+*+*+*
A/N - Do I love the conclusion of this chapter about a million times more than I ever did the old docks chapters? YES, YES I DO.
Also I love running around in various characters mindscapes and exploring them, how do I write an entire book in mindscapes thank you