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I sit here on a hard stone step, a hand once so warm now wet and cold clings to mine, surrounded by the three people I'm closest to in this whole world. We await our probable end in an ancient town made of new stone, all glistering with a thin veneer of algae, and oceanic mucus. We sit alone in this soundless place, devoid of all other life. Beyond the vacuous streets of gray slimy stone lie a vortex of fog so dense no human could see through it, not that any sane person would even want to attempt it.
People call me Vera, my true name and surname are irrelevant for now, for all traces of my lineage and existence have ceased to be. As well, please forgive my lack of dialog, the events I'm to describe have not been kind to my mind and recollection. The summer of half a decade behind us changed my life for the better... during my twelfth year in the small island town of... well, its name doesn't matter anymore, its original name already lost to annexation from a greater body alongside our culture and deity. Now even the crude approximation of that false name that was given to us nearing two centuries ago will now be forgotten with us. During that aforementioned summer, it was not unlike the others preceding it, my close friends and I often played on the calm ocean beaches of the town I once so adored. My friend Iris would always be absorbed in some book or another, more than often one detailing various flora and fauna around the world, whilst hiding herself in the shadow of some tree whose roots entangled into the sand. Often attempting to surprise us was Rue, ever the adventurous one who often found Iris and I on the quiet shores amongst the trees near silently blowing in the wind. Emerging from her free dives entangled in many blades of seaweed like some unknowable sea beast. Often Rue would come bearing gifts she found while out, often a piece of coral, a shell, even some little pieces of our history which was cast into the ocean during the annexors pillaging under the name of searching for forbidden materials. Something I certainly noted was Rue often gave most of her finds to Iris, who'd so excitedly take whatever object may be and search for it in her encyclopedias with a large smile. Rue happily gazes at her until Iris finds the information and they'd both happily giggle about it. They were dear friends to me, but sometimes I felt foreign to the nice little world those two often shared. I so wished to have a friendship as close as theirs...
This summer however my hopes would be answered by a girl around the same age as me, her family tourists among the droves of familiar faces of the island's inhabitants. This small island that was perfect to me, living in such a small population of maybe a one to two thousand at most; its warm summers and cool winters, the beauty of the underwater world dominated by corals and fish which all were so vibrant in pigment, a place I so gazed at with rose tinted glasses. That of course was until this new girl stepped into my world. She approached me for the first time, on a particularly lonely day where Rue and Iris were hanging out at Iris's house, and yet again I was left alone on the beach. She was the kindest girl I had ever known, we talked for hours about meaningless nonsense until she grabbed my hand and dragged me to her parents camper van which had been ferried to our island and which is now set up in the shadow of an overarching rockface on the beach which extends a decent distance into the water and was much further than I'd normally go out alone. Her parents were as warm and kind as she seemed, though they certainly were a tad odd. They were supposedly tourists, however they had tables set up outside their camper van with all numbers of objects not dissimilar to the remnants of our history such as what Rue had dredged up in the preceding years. Throughout the rest of our first encounter, Lily's parents seemed a tad nervous and apprehensive, as if even talking to me might be offensive. The peak of their awkwardness was upon hearing Lily say why they were there. Wasn't it obvious why they were there? This town is perfect, I thought at that moment. However hearing Lily's account of how strange she found it here, everyone shunning and shoeing away her and her parents, the archaic architecture made of barely cut logs, new roads made of old stone and only very old cars, why everyone in the town was deathly pale despite the constant blazing sun, why every single person in town had the same sickly green eye color, the list goes on... I didn't entirely understand, were things that different in the outside world? Lily was the first time I have ever known of varied eye color and tanning. For the first time my metaphorical rose tinted glasses shone jade towards my surroundings... The goal of her parents was to study and unearth the lost culture of my people's past. It grew very dark that night when I was with them. Getting home nearing midnight, not that my parents minded as no crime was committed in our town. That was the case at least, until I told them where I had been, they grew furious at me and told me not to associate with the people from the descendants of the very people who colonized our island.
Over the course of that fleeting summer I disobeyed my parents' orders. Every. Single. Day. I met with Lily as often as I could, interested in her words describing a world far past what I could ever imagine. Cities full of towers of glass and steel reaching towards the sky, full of hundreds of thousands of people all crammed together. For once in my life, what lay outside my island paradise astounded me. Many times Iris and Rue came with me to meet with Lily. She always amazed us, it's like she could do just about anything. She could keep up with Rue in the water and identify just about anything as fast as Iris, even things Iris couldn't, most of which were those artifacts from the culture forgotten. We all had so much fun back then... we grew inseparable. We hoped she didn't leave this town. Soon enough however her parents announced to use one evening that they were leaving in about a month from then. For the first time in our lives Rue, Iris and I feel what later I would learn is sadness, for sadness was not something that existed in our island paradise. In the end Rue comforted Iris about this sad truth leaving me alone and it fell on Lily to make me feel better, and... I found comfort in her, with an emotion I was yet to understand. I wished she wouldn't have to leave so soon and if she left at all to come back. Her warm hand held mine, promising to have as much fun together in the short time we had left together. About a week before they were to depart, while her parents were out in the reef, a terrible storm struck our small town. A storm like I've never seen, waves ravaged the coast, I swear I saw lightning continuously strike the same place in the ocean innumerable times. This day whatever the circumstances I stayed with Lily, all the way through the night. In the earliest hours of the morning Lily jolted out of the camper van and started climbing up the rockface that shielded her dwelling. Of course I followed her every move, when I finally reached its flat top however I saw her standing, and watching over the ocean. She turned to me, and what I saw in her was the most pitiable thing I could imagine. In this town which I've always resided I've never seen such a face contorted with despair, yet in that moment she was the most radiant I've ever seen her, against the backdrop of a terrible tempest her form shone brightly, emotion I've never conceived before me now, so alien to me, yet I understood its meaning perfectly. And it was in that moment that I think I truly saw her, and in return decided to stay by her side. I took her warm hand cooled by the raging storm, and returned her to her parents camper van.
Following that night Lily's parents were located, fed on by innumerable sea life and slight calcification were the state in which they washed up piece by piece. Death wasn't foreign to me, we are all human of course, the ceased existence of a being, however, a death like this was unknowable to me. Never in my life have I seen such an unnatural end. Following the first discovery Lily fell deeper into despair, shutting herself off from us, from me, for over a week. On the eighth day I practically forced my way into the camper van. Lily yelled and screamed at me to leave her alone, and despite all of her protests I marched right up to her and embraced her, and in return she laid her face upon my shoulder and wept for hours. Lily would permanently reside outside our town, in the shadow of that rock face. Following these events not a single resident of our town attempted to help her, only shunning her harder and treating her worse. Lily only lives on the meals Iris, Rue, and I brought her. Though after this, not once did anyone attempt to stop us from staying with her. Perhaps they pitied her now, as I had.
It took approximately half a year to draw Lily back out of her solitude and sorrow, a combined effort of the three of us, it certainly took time and effort but it was worth it completely. Our lives once again reached a stagnant normalcy, as it was a year before. Though now I have Lily by my side for as long as the two of us could bear. Lily started attending our school, well, more like no adult attempted to stop her. The student body however certainly took exception to her. It was hard work however Iris, Rue, and I brokered an uneasy armistice for Lily. Her reasons for attending I believe, have less to do with the pursuit of knowledge than spending time with the only people that seem to care about her. In the preceding year it was apparent that Lily had resumed scavenging the reef as her parents did before her. Despite my protests she continued which left only the option to support her. And we did, the three of us supported her with all our abilities. Rue combed the reefs with her, Iris cataloged and sorted all the recovered fragments of the past, which, now that I grew conscious of them, I had seen a fragment of truth I wish I hadn't. These so-called fragments of the past took the form of shards of gray stone, in the form of innumerable animals, the most notable among them were shrimp, some furry mammalian creature, and human, though not a single statue lay intact. I however was left lonely again. Everyone played a part to help this person in which I grew so fond of, even so, despite my feelings, I did the only thing I could, stay at her side. Skipping forward, now my fifteenth year altered my perception of life, Rue had confessed love for Iris, two girls together, huh? It took a decent amount of time for me to grow comfortable around them again. Love already felt a world away from me, now love between the same sex? Felt as alien as the emotions I had seen on Lily's face that fateful night when she lost her only family. Soon enough, life got back to normal, Iris and Rue still helped with Lily's work, however now they devoted more time to themselves and less time to us. Not that I minded, where Lily could still do her job, it fell on me to pick up Iris’s, and so I did, no matter how difficult the circumstances got, i continued to try until I could properly help her.
In the summer of my sixteenth year, exactly one day before the anniversary of her parents demise, on a day where Iris and Rue were galavanting around with each other, leaving Lily and I once again on our own, Lily told me we needed to talk. She however, ignored her own statement for the entirety of that day, until we reached around dinner. While eating our shared meal, credit to my parents at least, who had started making more food for our meals to help feed Lily, though of course they'd never admit it. That night, under the stars in light of a small fire pit which had grown permanent, did Lily confess her love to me. I don't remember anything else from that night save for Lily once again secluding herself into the camper van, awaiting an answer. That night I sat awake, racking my brain of what to do, and how I should feel. I thank whatever gods may be for letting her stay here with me, wasn't that proof enough that I returned her feelings? I desperately wanted to stay by her side. Even if I am unable to properly answer her confession, even if my love for her isn't real, if that's what it takes to stay by her side, I'll even fake feelings for her, for Lily...
It wasn't until the next day that I'd get my true answer. With foreboding clouds on the horizon, my parents stopped my every attempt to depart from the house. Desperately wanting to comfort Lily on that day of all days. It wasn't until I could hear the boom of thunder on the horizon, and in real time see the clouds literally rolling in, swirling in a visual cacophony of distorted and vague shapes that I was able to sneak out. The storm had reached its precipice while I was nearing her dwelling. Despite rain propelled directly counter to me I still ran, it seemed as if my life depended on it, little did I know it truly would. As I approached her dwelling I felt what, for the first time I would refer to as fear, the rusted shell of the camper van naught but vacant. I practically ransacked the vehicle looking for any evidence of Lily's whereabouts. Finding nothing, I went to the only place I could imagine. And once again I scaled that rock face, no regard for my self preservation, nearly getting blown off by the dire gales twice, though in the end I reached the small plateau. At the end of it, in the ocean I saw Lily standing there hugging... some object... what it was I could not discern for her back was to me. Despite my lapses in recollection I remember what was said between us this day perfectly.
I called out to her as I ran to her "Lily!"
She turned to me, I nearly jumped when I looked into her eyes, as if the life and warmth behind them had faded "I found it Vera"
"Found what?"
"Your history, what my parents had been searching for. Earlier today I went for a dive before the storm rolled in. I waited for you, I really did. I didn't think you'd come to see me again after I confessed to you. But now it's too late, with this I can finish their work..." Lily proceeded to show me a disc made of gray stone, its facade I couldn't even hope to understand or articulate, a series of lines that at the same time interconnect and don't. She let me gaze at it for long enough before continuing.
"Vera, I'm going to see it through, and for that I have to leave..."
Dread, the word for what I was feeling at that moment. A thousand different thoughts rushed through my mind. I couldn't lose her.
"Wait! Lily I-"
She cut me off in that second.
"Shut up! Please Vera... Don't say it. Don’t say anything If you do this will be impossible for me to do... I love you…"
"No! Lily! I-"
"Goodbye Vera..."
With that last farewell Lily held that disc tightly and threw herself backwards off the tall cliff face into the ocean. I collapsed to my knees, horribly scraping them up, my body shivering in this storm, yet I could only stare off into the ocean. Staring yet not seeing. I cannot remember much detail, everything was blurry. I could see the clouds, the massive waves threatening to wash the only remnants of Lily on the island away, lightning repeatedly striking the same two spots near each other. With each strike the interval between them lessended, both getting closer in timing. As they approached synchronicity, I swear flashes of pure dark accompanied the flashes of pure light. With the final strike however, the lightning lingered. Only for a moment, the bolts of electricity froze together, multiple offshoots overlapping each other and shining brightly, between them lie a paradox of void in direct contrast to its stagnant glow.
My next memory was Iris and Rue finding me, still slumped on the surface. I don't remember much after that. I don't remember if any words were spoken between us. I don't remember walking home. I only remember my room. Reality beyond the limits of my bedroom ceased to be. My island paradise was gone. All the people I had ever known and conversed with were gone. With Lily's disappearance, the person known as Vera died. I simply existed, at first sad, then later depressed, finally reaching apathy. I stayed in my room, for how long I can't remember or imagine. The only proof something outside my reality existed was meals that appeared on the floor next to my door daily. After that however, even the concept of time ceased.
At some point during this silent solitude, I started dreaming... At first it was just concepts, myself floating in a void of white, then dark, then an ocean of black water with no land in sight. Drifting throughout these endless conceptions. Eventually a small mass of land appeared on my horizon. The first real thing to materialize in a world of nothing. An island bearing nothing but a massive stone structure appearing to rival the size of the "skyscrapers'' Lily had once told me of. The ocean grew impatient and a current swept me up. Its intent was clear as I barreled toward the island. My vision, albeit distorted, showed me ancient wooden warships, bearing the colors of a land unknown to me surrounding this island by the dozens. As I washed upon the beach. My muscles atrophied, I could barely stand, yet I still did, and limped toward the temple. Nearing halfway to the temple I looked at it properly, not that I couldn't see it before, I refused to see it before. Terrible facades of oceanic monsters of legend carved into gray stone. I looked down towards the door and all the statuette shards made sense. All of the various parts found could fit together into the same visage as a towering statue before me. How it looked, however, I can never articulate. Whenever I try to think about it, I remember it less and less, as if my mind is actively trying to keep it from me. Regardless, as I was staring towards this temple I was startled by someone, a soldier from one of the boats running past me. Then another, and another. The entire fleet unloading its army onto the beaches to ransack the temple before me. I reached the temple stairs when the first explosion rang out. Looking up as the great statue cried out the sound of stone crumbling before toppling over with cheers. I calmly walked past them all, emotionally still in an apathetic vacuum. Regardless, these militants appear to heed me no mind or mention. Approaching the great stone door a large round object landed at my feet before detonating. I could see or hear nothing for several moments just ringing and the color black. That was until a sharp gale exuded in an instant from the now open temple. Before me was a woman. I didn't get a good look as the wind blew directly into my eyes and forced me to close them. I heard and felt as she walked directly through me, what I felt however, was cold, a chill ran throughout my entire body. Her voice sounded so familiar but I couldn't place it.
"Humans will forever be truculent, rebellious fools-"
I turned around to see her back to me, her hair was long and not dissimilar to mine. Am I seeing my people's past? Is this an ancestor of mine? This line of inquisitive thoughts was cut short by her holding out her hand in front of herself. And then as I blinked and reopened my eyes, all of the soldiers and ships were gone? And the temple returned to pristine condition. My taking this all in was interrupted by the familiar voice.
"Vera..."
The figure turned around and it was as if I was staring into a reflection.
"Who are-"
Interrupted by this mirror of myself.
"Lily"
The next moment I can remember was waking up panting and trembling with my heart racing. In that dream I felt nothing, not even emotion, only the chill of me walking through myself. Now however, all feelings that have been absent since my memory recollection ceased I've felt all at once. Staring down at my shaking hands my fingers look... boney? Taking over an hour to calm down I take a proper look at myself. I appear near anorexic, glancing down I see mounds of what once was food, now enveloped in mold now littering my room. Changing into a new set of clothes and leaving my room, glancing at my parents as I silently walk past them out the front door. Setting off towards Lily's abode at a decent pace leaves me time to look at my town. This town I realize is not the paradise I once believed it to be. The whole world feels different yet the same. As if a few layers of vibrancy were stripped away with my happiness. Truly I had fallen in love with Lily for without her, my paradise was lost. Judging by the air temperature we were in the midst of winter, it seems I had been in reclusivity for half a year in the blink of an eye. Reaching my seventeenth year should have felt more joyous. The ground beneath my feet was wet, the best I can guess is a storm the night before. Approaching the beach was strange, peering at what the tides wash ashore was- fish shaped statues? Hundreds of them? I'll figure out that one later. In the distance I saw a pillar of smoke from where Lily's dwelling was, and upon seeing it I started running in it's direction. For the first time in my life I felt the emotion known as hope.
Perhaps running wasn't a good idea in retrospect, as my body was under the effects of malnutrition. I, however, still made it there intact. Waiting for me there were my friends- Iris, Rue, and thankfully Lily, all chatting and laughing together. All the people that I cared about are before me in one place... Could things really return back to normal? I froze, hesitating to call out to them. I nearly turned away before Lily called out to me, snapping me out of whatever intrusive delusion I was having. She sprinted straight at me and embraced me with a hug. This time it was my turn to break down onto the other shoulder enveloped by her warmth. Looking up, Iris and Rue were holding hands while watching us with smirks. Pulling away after I recovered was probably the hardest thing I've ever had to do. Gazing into her eyes I could see a look of loneliness fade away as I'm sure she saw in mine. Though I did not voice it one thing continued to concern me, were her eyes always sickly green? It doesn’t matter is the answer I resolved myself with and continued. The four of us talked and joked for the entire day. That night, after Iris and Rue left, did Lily once again confirm her love for me, and I finally was able to return it, truthfully, from the bottom of my heart. I wished she would never leave my side again. And from that night I never returned to my home.
In the following few months, not once did I inquire where she had resided during my isolation. I had resigned myself to willful blissful ignorance, lest I threaten these days of happiness. Days and nights feeling the warmth of another human. Spending days just talking or reading a story together. Sitting on the beach, spending time with Iris and Rue. However, as the days grew longer I grew uneasy. The warmth of Lily's touch began to fade. Not all at once mind you, but... day by day her touch still beheld its power over my heart, just her body temperature started dropping, from her extremities first. And with the terrible storms rolling in with chilling air more frequently, I worry about her health. Quickly approaching the anniversary of our first meeting she grew even colder, and began displaying even weirder symptoms. Her eyes glazing over occasionally, her getting paler, some moments when I call to her she would zone out completely and mutter to herself. I felt my world shallowly be supported on a foundation of my own blind devotion.
The date of our first meeting arrived with haste. The night proceeding we went to sleep embracing on her bed in her near destitute van, hearing the calming gentle waves caressing the beach, the low rumble of thunder in the distance... The next thing I remember is sitting up suddenly in that same cot where I had laid myself to rest to the sound of the slamming door.
"Wait!" I screamed in confusion before my sense returning. I could already feel as such but the sudden illumination of lightning revealed that I was utterly in the presence of no one. From that moment I rushed to the door and nearly ripped it off its rusted hinges as it opened. Standing before me was a rather thoroughly soaked Iris and Rue. They explained that they were coming to check on us as into the early hours of the morning the storm had only gotten worse and they feared for the safety of Lily and I whose camper van lay near the ocean waves. Realization and anxiety struck me, and I rushed out of the camper and started to scale the rock face for the final time, in the worsening hurricane who's vigorous wiles attempt to dissuade me from climbing met my heavy resistance as my friends call out to me from behind. Slipping twice yet catching myself, peering down near the precipice had vertigo affected me for the first time. Steeling myself as I finish my ascending, I crawl up and hold myself there catching my breath as I barely allowed myself to stand in this gale. Lily stood near the ledge of the plateau, staring off into the ocean. Rushing to her I wrap my arms around her.
"Lily! What are-"
Her voice was tranquil, in stark contrast to our surroundings.
"I'm sorry Vera- I wanted to let this go, but I just couldn't, not to the town that took my family"
My response was intercepted by a lightning strike nearby offshore. Looking up I see the stone disc I had seen previously. Another bolt of lightning strikes it as it shatters into individual triangle shapes, sending arcs of lightning out in many directions, nearly even hitting us, yet... Lily collapses. Catching her and holding her tight as I descend to my knees resting her on my lap. Quickly after that Rue followed by Iris reached the plateau and rushed over to Lily and I.
All at once did the deluge from the sky cease. We were both in the eye of the storm and as I would learn, the eye of ruin. From then I tended to Lily, holding her so close. Her warmth I had once basked in, now so frigid. The Lily who previously shone with such radiance was pale like the dead, color draining from her face and barely could I feel a pulse. Anxiety and dread welled within my heart. Shutting the world out it felt as if I were enraptured by static. The drone of white noise cutting me off from the entirety of the world I knew which enveloped me for an eternity only to be suddenly interrupted by Lily's form arching her back with a loud gasp as she looked out upside down towards the ocean.
"A god unacknowledged is a being non existent" Lily yelled with such furor before passing out immediately again. My immediate fears and questions were interrupted by lightning striking out on the sea... and splitting? Not as normal where it branches off, but as in distinct lines. Once again lightning froze, which I must admit is honestly less surprising the second time. Barely being able gaze at the origin of this petrified light scarcely reveals a vague dark triangular shape to where five bolts coalesce in a classical star configuration. My wonderment filled daze was interrupted by Iris and Rue barely dragging Lily and I away from the cliffside. I'm... unsure of how much time passed in that previous moment. For the eye of the storm had just barely passed over us however now, it's clear the other end is nearing, if it were a long time why had the others not intervened sooner. I received no answers as they looked at me as if I was mad? Nor did they have recollection of Lily's fantastical sounding utterance before she had collapsed. With the entire shore at risk of the tides ransacking all that wasn't dug in, I just wished we were safe, nothing less than a miracle explains how we successfully descended the unconscious Lily down the rockface.
Our attempts to progress inland were halted by hearing a nearly indescribable noise, I could akin it most to the sound of a large wind instrument whose cacophony resonated in every portion of my being. Returning our joint gaze to our rear, we now see more bolts in the distances surrounding my village. All at once did the stars above us and the storm entraping all I've ever known disappeared into a black void, spread between the lightning "bars” of our effulgent prison. I felt a strange serenity, as if everything was right in the world. Glancing over to my friends overwrote all of my emotions at the time, seeing their faces contorted in such foreboding trepidation sent me spiraling into feeling the same. Our frigid shelves only reawakened by a sudden wave of warm air as fog started rising from the ocean. We start to regain our perception in time to see the water level rise... at least that was what our collective assumed. Then the first droplets started dripping skyward. The water rising up the beach like an unstoppable tidal wave, losing way too much water to the sky to continue its encroachment, though it slithered toward us all the same. This fiery water now reaches a sandlocked tree. Instantly the water spread up the tree, reacting as if fire, the tree was consumed, leaving a stone pillar as the branches now crumbled under their own weight and impaled the sand connected by weird strands of mucus. Regaining our senses once more, we moved as fast as we could muster. We moved and moved into the center of town, the other towns folk in a mass hysteria until my still weakened body burdened by another, collapsed in the square.
Scraping my just about everything against the abrasive concrete. I stay still, unmoving, just feeling the chill of the stone, a soft ringing in my ears, feeling the vibrations of the many attempting to abscond from... huh... what are we running from...? impending doom? Some medusian abysmal flames? What's the point? Lily being rolled off my back by Rue and Iris. I in turn roll to my front and sit up, bending forward looking down to my knees. I felt tears welling up up in my eyes before they streamed down my cheeks. Looking up I see contorted expressions of all the others. One unfortunate soul brushed against the animated fluid, watching them struggle and scream as it spreads across them, their body contorting into impossible angles as they struggle. Why was I crying? In this moment I felt nothing. I don't understand why everyone is panicking. Why was I running before. Why's that ringing getting louder? Why are Rue and Iris crying? Why are they embracing each other? Are they scared? Lily, why won't you wake up? Would you be scared? Nothing makes sense anymore! Am... am I scared? Ah that must be it. Its honestly kind of funny, watching the death of life as it gets closer. Reduced to a scared child, it's really funny "heh... hehehehahahaHAHA!"
As the doom finally approaches rendering all petrified, I take the unconscious Lily's hand, my face still wet from whatever I was feeling. The abysmal wave mere meters away. I sit here on a hard stone step, a hand once so warm now wet and cold clings to mine, surrounded by the three people I'm closest to in this whole world. We await our probable end in an ancient town made of new stone, all glistering with a thin veneer of algae, and oceanic mucus. We sit alone in this soundless place, devoid of all other life. Beyond the vacuous streets of gray slimy stone lie a vortex of fog so dense no human could see through it, not that any sane person would even want to attempt it. Does sanity or reality even exist at this point? Looking over I watch as Rue and Iris entwined are enveloped, their end was far more beautiful than all the other angular desperate messes in my peripheral. Next taken was Lily in her peaceful solitude of dreams. Then it was finally my time, I closed my eyes... Darkness and quiet was all that I found being enveloped. Finally that ringing stopped. At this moment the world I knew had died.
Light? Daytime? What? There is life after death? "Not quite, well for your kind anyway."
The sounds of crashing waves fill my ears. I started to get up only to be met with the grave reminder my lover and friends were gone... "again not quite."
Standing up suddenly I start looking around for the source of the conversation. Yet I... feel so calm, as if all was right in the world... maybe it was... "Derived from the Greek meaning 'to bring victory' and you certainly did. In flower language it means 'devotion and loyalty' which you were as well. And finally derived from Latin it means 'true image' which it's time to meet your own my dear Veronica"
These words sent all my hairs on end. I stumbled around as I felt my face, my tears petrified to my face. Feeling a presence behind myself I suddenly turn only to be met with... myself? Like from the island? I need to find out what's happening "Wh-"
Only to be cut off "Listen and listen well incarnation of my will, the only reason I'm forced to converse with you in this visage is because you yet continue to wallow in your own ignorant wishes. First you wish for you own dearest. Then you wish for her not to leave, to forget my visage, for her to not leave your side, and then finally for safety. I have granted you all you wished and in return you were the means to an end. After all incarnation, you set all the pieces into place. A god unacknowledged is a being non existent after all. I would thank you but... this is fate how we're here now. Uniting your dear friend Rue who found my statuettes in the ocean. Iris who gave them meaning. Lily and her ilk who also strengthened that meaning. Of course it was annoying to remove those two from the equation but my dear incarnation so desperately wanted them gone. Regardless, all useful tools in the end, finally erasing my last mistake. This will be the last time we meet incarnation have you one last desire? Don't bother saying it. I already know"
With that last statement my reflection tore itself into nothingness. Aswell- the stone shells of Rue, Iris, and Lily start cracking, as do the petrified tears on my face.
The next few weeks were rather rough. The four of us are barely able to find enough food to survive this desolate necropolis. I haven't told them where we are or why, or even what happened. I don't entirely understand it myself, but as for where, the waves around our island were pure black, so I can only assume we lie in the same waters of my dream. Soon enough however a mangled, yet oddly familiar looking wooden ship washed ashore our beach while we slept. The hold mostly intact gave us plenty of provisions to get by, no, to thrive. And in the captain's cabin I have located a journal of such fantastical stories hidden under the captain's bed. The "Liber Invictus” is indicated by its being etched into the front. There is no harm in writing my story here... right?