Existence to Dream

Her sneaker slipped.
“Are you alright?”
“Yes… Don’t stop for me,” Dream said to him.
They had to move quickly. Scaling the slick and shiny cliffs was tricky. Rain kept falling. It had been falling since they were below the mountain looking up. The elements knew their journey was near an end, and didn’t like it.
And to think… A few weeks ago her world made sense. Her name was Dream, and she lived a turbulent existence. Awakened daily by torpedoes tearing through her neighborhood streets, Black Clad agents kidnapping children like her by the bulk, injecting them with an unexplained agent… Experiencing struggle and laughter with her adopted sister and brother in the basement of the old church, the boy and the girl defined her existence- They didn’t make it to the mountain with her.
A few weeks ago his world made sense. His name was dark, and he lived a violent but linear existence. He was a soldier. His main purpose was to fight; eliminate the enemy until it was his time. Don’t touch the ground, don’t ever enter the cities, never go anywhere without a spotter, and always keep your guns clean. There was no happiness, no love, and no fulfillment in what he did. Emotions were forbidden- for his own safety, and the safety of others. It rocked his existence to know there was a battle far greater than the one he knew.
“There only a few yards to climb,” Dark urged her forward. “You can rest, and I’ll cut the string myself.”
“No. I want to be there,” Dream replied. She squeezed her sneaker into a groove, climbing diagonally.
Thunder slapped the surface of the ground below, nearly breaking her concentration. After all they’d been through, there was no way she’d allow a slip of her foot to end it all.
She thought of the enormous lizard they had to escape when she entered the first world- Dark’s world- which turned out to be the last world they'd be. Her brother and sister were there the first time, not then. They’d still be around if they’d just listened to her and stayed behind. Though; if they hadn’t followed her into those strangely dangerous new worlds, she mightn’t have made it so far. Her thoughts were bittersweet. She wanted them back. She wouldn’t allow a simple slip… their sacrifices will not be in vain.
“You’re slowing.”
Dream ignored the pounding in her skull. “I’m fine I said.”
He disappeared over the top of the mountain. As she rose higher to the top, his hand reached down to her. Her foot reached for a groove, and came up empty.
“Dark!”
Just as the slippery mountain was to eject her into the, he caught her by the wrist. He swung her to a stepping stone, allowing her to recapture the rocks.
Only a few feet to go…
She rolled over the edge, allowing the cold rain to fall over her face. She felt a hand on her cheek. Knowing his touch, she exhaled. “Dark…”
She shot up, wrapping her arms around his neck, squeezing like she never wanted to let go. “I don’t want this to end.”
“It has to Dream. It has to.” He threw his wrist over her shoulder, pushing back the wet strands of hair sticking to her cheekbones with his knuckles.
“We made it,” said Dark.
“Yeah…” She sighed. “We… made it.”
“Can I kiss you again?”
“Yeah stupid.”
She laughed with tears and rain flowing down her face. It was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen, her smile under the storm. Her smile was apart of the order of the universe, like the sunrise, like the stars coming out at night and the tides, like the seasons. He wondered if memory existed beyond existence; if his memories would exist after he was… gone. The thought was a paradox, well beyond his comprehension, he knew but wondered anyway. She was beauty to him. He understood. He kissed her.
In their minds, the universe vanished around them. The lightning faded to static. The torrential rain receded to droplets, then air. They released, and reality returned.
“Its time,” Dark said to her.
“No… cant we just… a little longer?” Dream wished she had the power to freeze time. There just wasn’t enough of it.
“No. Time’s almost up. The window’s about to close.”
“I change my mind. I don’t want this.”
“You cant change your mind. If we don’t do this…” He pulled her closer. A bright glowing red light covered the mountaintop. She knew what it was.“Your world will survive. Existence will live… You’ll live.”
“I cant…”
“You must.”
“No. I cant!”
“Listen to me dream. If you don’t, reality as we know it will end. We have to.”
“What kind of reality will I be left with, huh?! Everybody I know is dead… and now… you expect me to erase you… from existence? How could you expect me to live with that? How could you expect me to live without you…? You’re all I have.” She fell to her knees.
“Remember the words,” he said to her, picking her up from her knees. “Existence becomes dream… I’ll be in your dreams.”
“Dreams fade,” she replied in a defeated whisper. “And after you’re gone, my memory of you will fade. That’s how it’s happened every time. We’ve visited these unbelievable places together, and I don’t even remember where I’ve been. We’ve already erased three worlds from existence… I’ve eliminated entire universes, and I can’t remember one detail about them. I know my brother and sister are dead… I don’t even remember how.”
“Somebody wrote this on my arm…” Dark rolled up his sleeve, revealing a long, faded text. “…keep me in your spirit. The spirit is well beyond the mind’s reach.”
She lifted her eyes. His fiery wings blocked the sky, evaporating the rain, drying her tears.
“We did what we had to… to save existence. Now, what you could for them is… keep them all in your spirit. Then they’ll always ex-”
Three whistles across the air silenced him. He fell into her arms, then to his knees. His wings flickered then faded into smoke.
“Dark!”
She stood between him and the ground.
“Dark! Dark answer me!”
“I’m fine,” he replied in agony.
Dark’s fellow soldier had climbed over the mountain from the opposite end, firing his rifle three times before fully taking his position at the top. All three struck their target.
“I can’t let you do that,” said the rifleman, projecting his voice over the rain.
Dark rolled over on his side, laying his head in her chest, facing his former spotter.
“Stand down…”
“No… No… You stand down, Sarge!” The rifleman ran across the flooding surface, eliminating distance between them. He slammed the butt of his rifle into her, sending her to the ground, coughing. “I can’t believe you gonna let this bitch talk you into erasing us. Do you get it… not dead, but erased like we never existed.”
“It’s something we have to do,” Dark replied. He felt cold.
“Bullshit! We could’ve found out where her strings were and torched ‘em. This whole thing would’ve all been over.”
“Listen…”
“At least I know death. At least I know if there isn’t a higher power or an afterlife, my body would be rotting somewhere, being pecked by crows and maggots. At least I know everything, my life my death, would have meaning.”
Dark watched the soldier that used to respect him. The spotter was frightened, disillusioned, confused; faced with a fate worst than death- non existence.
“Spotter… If we don’t do this the other universes will cease to exist.”
“If we do, we cease to exist!”
“Haven’t you learned anything. Its bigger than us… all of it. We’d be destroying it all.”
“I’m fine with that… at least we get to go where everyone else is going.” Spotter raised his rifle, ready to finish the job.
Dark released his second most powerful emotion, fear. Two flapping shards of ice tore through his shoulder blades, slapping his spotter to the other end of the mountaintop. Dark staggered to his feet. Crimson dripped from his boot, disappearing into the rain as it hit the ground. Spotter was unconscious: far removed from his rifle which never landed.
He checked his watch.
“No time.” He could feel the existence around him unraveling. He reached down to his unconscious beauty, stroking her cheek, leaving three streaks of his own blood on her face. It was time now. He limped towards the middle of the mountaintop.
“Come on out…” he said.
He blinked. As his eyes unclasped, a child faded into his sight –as expected. The child’s eyes were as clear as air, as her skin took the glow of the lighting striking around her. She looked at him. That’s what you look like, he thought to himself. In a world so chaotic and violent; it’s irony that their string was a child.
“Who are you?” The child’s mouth was a wave of lightning which buzzed with each word.
“I’m nobody…,” he answered back, limping closer. He couldn’t avoid the lightning bolts; they were too many. He kept forward. None struck, though he moved in a straight line. He knew nothing could stop him, not even a million volts; so there was no need for dexterity.
“Your wings crumble,” the child informed him.
“I know,” he said, as one of his wings snapped from his back, shattering like glass on the ground below. He drew close, falling to the ground from exhaustion.
“Why are you here?” The child questioned him as any child would question anything they didn’t understand.
“For you,” Dark replied.
“Oh...” The child cradled her elbows. “I feel cold.”
“I promise… You wont feel cold for much longer.”
She knelt down, touching him on his remaining wing. “Thank you mister…”
“Please… don’t thank me.” He drove his fist into her chest. She screamed as lighting struck them both. For a second he could feel the super-surges of electricity ripping through his body, back and forth, back and forth; but the pain faded quickly. The lightning kept striking, but he felt nothing more than a pinch. He opened his eyes. She was gone- just like the others. He wanted to sleep, but he had to move. She didn’t have much time. He limped fast to her position on the bridge.
His spotter awoke, doing something he never thought possible; weeping. “What have you done sarge?”
Dark didn’t answer him, though he kept repeating the question in enraged bellows.
He reached down with the strength he had left to lift her into his arms. He had walked her to the mountain’s edge when her eyes began to open.
“Dark?”
“Yes Dream?”
She’d given him the device in hopes he’d follow her back. He knew that was impossible, but let her do it anyway knowing it would make her happy to feel hope.
“Will you come with me?”
“You know that’s against the laws. If I come with you, it would just be my body… I’d be gone.”
“Then I won’t leave.”
“Then you would suffer the same… your mind and spirit would cease to exist. I cant allow that.” He pressed the button on the device, opening a pink vortex below the mountain.
She tried to wrestle out of his arm. “Please don’t do this Dark.”
“Goodbye Dream. I… love you.”
“No-“
He dropped her over the edge. She disappeared into the pink vortex. He tossed the device after her. He had no need for it any longer. He fell to the ground. He no longer felt pain. He lifted his watch to his face to see his fingers had faded to nothing and the rest of him was following fast. He looked over to his spotter who was suffering the same fate. He reached into his pocket with his hand that still existed. He drew an origami, one she made him, dropping it under his eyes.
He took his final breath as his existence faded. His final hope; is she would keep him alive in her spirit.