Chapter 49 – The Child Without a Face

The earth trembled as paper is torn. Yusuf stood atop what used to be a city, now merely shattered memory-scaffolding, disintegrating walls that turned to dust if you even breathed upon them lightly. Above was a washed-out sky, smudged gray like a poor photo. And in front of him—waiting for him—was the child.

The child had no face, no eyes, no lips. And it smiled.

"You've come a long way," the child panted, though its head did not move. Its voice was a wraith of sound, one thread of a thousand spun. "But you were meant to start here."

Yusuf clutched his shard of light—the last piece of the Codex—and held his breath. His heart was racing, but his hand remained steady. "Then let's just get it over with."

The battle ground creaked, walls collapsing, roads splintering into streams of light. Battle was on.

Phase One: Shattered Land

The boy splattered forward. Yusuf didn't even get time to lift his shard when the first blow—a hidden something like an onrushing stormfront—hit him and tossed him among the wreckage. His ribcage screamed, dust filled his gullet.

He came up standing, unsteady. The child hung over the shattered sidewalk, its form wobbling in video snow. Then it fell—two, four, six shadows breaking away, all faceless, all smiling.

Yusuf struck with the shard of glass, its cutting edge swooping through one shadow, the next—but every time one was knocked down, another shuffled in to take its place. His heart was hammering, strangling.

"Shards against shards," the child-chorus voice spat. "You will not win."

The ground beneath Yusuf trembled like glass. He collided with darkness, fell onto rock that was not rock—cool, etched with memory. The darkness enfolded him, consumed him like wolves.

Yusuf held his shard near to him. He whispered to himself: Remember why you fight. Remember who you are.

Furiously, he charged. The shard throbbed, sliced through the ring, scattering the shadows into dust. The field lay open for a moment.

And the cold, raw laughter of the child.

"That was only the beginning."

Phase Two: The Flood of Faces

Memory distorted. Towers bent in the form of roots, curved into an empty museum. And on the walls—faces. Thousands of faces, chiseled into the walls.

Yusuf had at first thought that they were strangers. But then he saw them flash. Friends. Allies. Worlds he'd saved. Worlds he'd lost. The desert townspeople. Elarra's archivists. The drowned city. Faces who'd looked at him with hope in their eyes.

All faces cried out. A torrent of voices descended upon him, tearing him to his knees.

The child stood between them, faceless amongst the faces. "They all remember you," it said to him. "They remember your failure. Your absence. Your weakness."

The faces against the walls peeled, falling from the stone and casting themselves as half-real spirits. They grasped at Yusuf, echoing his voice.

"You left us."

"You were not enough."

"Why do you get to remember when we are forgotten?"

Yusuf thrashed, the shard slicing wraiths to confetti. But it was growing increasingly difficult with each blow. Each cut reeled. The voices were within him, leeching him.

He leaned on the wall. His own face smiled there—stone-cut face, wide eyes with fear.

The child tilted its head. "You are not saving them. You are gathering them. And you will drown among them."

Yusuf screamed, forced the shard into the wall. Flame burned through stone. The hall flared in white flame, eating faces. The voices stopped.

When the flames died, Yusuf shivered, perspired, lungs burned.

And the child, untouched, said: "Better. Let us dig further now."

Phase Three: Names in the Ash

The field changed again—into an ash plain under a dead sky. Wind howled, carrying whispers.

For a moment, Yusuf had believed it the same nameless refrain. And then—he froze.

A name. A name he recognized.

"Rae."

The ash curled in mid-air, forming the letters before it dissipated into fragments. And another breathed softly:

"Rae."

His chest hurt. His fingers relaxed on the shard.

The blank head of the child contorted. "Ah. That one. Do you recall her, Yusuf? For no one ever remembers you."

The ash twisted once more, hundreds of names ablaze now—names of the dead, the lost. Rae's among them, slicing, real, like a slash of blade across his heart.

Yusuf knelt. His vision faded. He could hear her voice in his head: "You already have me."

And now, here, the laughter of the child warped it, spun it around him. "You had her. And lost her. As you lose everything."

The names roiled in his head like a storm. His own name burned brightest among them. His hands shook.

"No," he panted. His lungs were in convulsions. "No—I haven't lost her."

He forced the shard into the ash. Fire erupted, erased names for an instant. The storm faltered.

The child moved forward, faceless smile enlarging. "You will."

And then—over the shriek of names—he heard it.

Weak. A whisper. But there.

"Yusuf…"

Rae's voice. Not the spirit of the child. Hers.

The storm shrieked for an instant. Yusuf drew breath, clung to the sound as a rope in suffocating water.

The boy winced, faceless head quivering. "No. That voice isn't yours to hear."

But Yusuf had already rolled on his side. The shard was warmer in his palm.

Her voice sounded out. Still calling. "Don't stop."

Phase Four: The Last Tether

The ash plain exhaled into nothing. Yusuf tumbled, spinning in infinite darkness. The boy followed him, serene, waiting.

"You can't fight forever," it gasped. "All things end in silence. All things end forgotten."

Yusuf slammed onto a splinter of glass suspended in emptiness. Shatterness spread out around him. He scrambled to his knees, blood trickling from his lips.

The child came to rest beside him. Its arms reached out—spindly fingers, thin, dark strings unwinding like claws.

Yusuf flinched. His arms trembled. His shard dissolved.

And then—once more—her voice.

Ethereal. Delicate. As if chiseled from the threshold of existence.

"Yusuf. Stand."

His head snapped back. His heart constricted. His knees locked firm.

The kid's claws ripped. Yusuf stared up at the shard, bracing for the impact. The glass platform burst, shaking spasmodically in rainstorms of light.

But Yusuf didn't drop. He rose on wings of his own volition, the shard burning like a second sun.

He roared into the empty spaces:

"I am not alone. Not while I remember them. Not while I struggle for them!"

The child shrieked—a shriek without mouth, without end. Its claws retracted, seared by light.

For an instant, Yusuf triumphed.

But the voice was gone. Rae's breath skipped, then broke into nothing.

The last string broke.

Phase Five: Last Stand

Yusuf drifted alone in the nothing. No words. No friends. Not even Rae.

Only him.

Only the shard.

Only the child.

The child spread its arms wide. Its form grew, a vast shadow that engulfed the stars. "Now you are mine."

Yusuf took a deep breath. The shard ignited into white fire, white fire in his palm.

"Good," he gasped. His eyes burned, but his voice was firm. "Then there's nothing more that you can take."

The emptiness was still, as if the entire world stood suspended with breath bated.

And Yusuf pressed on.