Dream Cycle

"Theoretically, because Alma has a connection to this world, I should be able to find where she has gone. But without her here, it is completely impossible for us to slip together into whichever parallel universe she currently resides. I may be able to go alone, if I shed this form temporarily, but I will have to leave you behind for the time being Hwalín."

"That's fine, Nia." The Hecatian placed a hand on the eldritch woman's small shoulder. "I know you can easily handle yourself out there without me. I reckon you've recovered enough of your power by now, yeah?"

"It should suffice. If I am to leave, it must be immediate. There is no telling what kind of trouble Alma has found herself in." Qu'l-Nia studied the air in front of her, where Alma had departed the world from. There was something there, beyond mortal comprehension, that only she could perceive. The woman turned to Hwalín and an almost imperceptible smile spread across her lips. "Leave now. And do not forget to avert your senses from my transformation, my friend—fragmentary as it may be—lest the light burn the corneas from your eyes.”

“Aye. I know the drill, mate,” Hwalín replied. She had already turned away from the alien woman and was gradually making distance. While keeping her face forward, she yelled back, "Watch your arse, Nia. That's unknown territory you're waltzing into. Without you, we're well and truly fucked. And I don't think I can do this on my own."

"It should not come to that,” came Qu’l-Nia’s voice in the distance. “I promise I will return with Alma in hand. But if I do not return in a few days’ time, then you must seek out Derleth in my stead. Find him and convince him to help you.”

The Hecatian could feel a slight heat at her back, signaling her to shut her eyes tight and to block her sensitive ears.

What started as a lambent light grew into a sudden, blinding radiance. The trees immediately surrounding the eldritch woman had become completely void of color or warmth. Qu’l-Nia was spinning while the light shone from her body. An endless pirouette performed perfectly in a cosmic gyre of effulgence. As she spun gracefully, an eldritch melody rang from within her. A song of dreamlike worlds with crepuscule lands and mist-shrouded castles hanging high in the sky. Where strange cosmic creatures with bellies full of eternity roam under the radiant light of the thick crescent Banapis. And at the crescendo of her aria, the air in front of her tore open, revealing a strange space outside the universe. Qu’l-Nia rose slowly above the ground, her form now twisting and bending, and shot straight into the swirling vapor of nothingness in front of her.

But the form that came out the other side was not that of a young woman with platinum hair. In her place was a glimmering gelatinous being garbed in alabaster white, with a bioluminescent crown shaped like an umbrella sprouting from her head. Trailing glittering tentacles of platinum fell from the rim of this crown, twinkling with an otherworldly hue. Strange white frills dangled elegantly from her arms and high from her hips, forming an ethereal tutu around her lower half. The chromatic light emanating from her body trailed off of her in swift ardent motions as she swam through the twilight skies of the realm between worlds that she called home.

As she sped to her destination, following along an invisible trail that only she could see, memories outside of time filled her mind. Eons of missing memories came rushing back, of the past and events yet to come—the momentary glimpse of time she spent traveling along with her aeons-old friends, Alma and Hwalín, and the ultimate fate of their journey. A newfound fervor filled her. Hundreds of foreign emotions she didn’t understand. Through mystic eyes, tears fell and were lost among vast infinities, remembering things better left dormant. A blighted future filled with arduous hardships and things not being as they seem. And him. If only she had seen things clearly from the beginning. She had to warn Alma as soon as possible, for the memories of things to come will fade once again.

The eldritch woman moved at incredible speeds—beyond the cold wastes of the cursed plateau and past the city of Inganok that rests in the ethereal domes between the steep, endless mountains where a tribe of the elder ones slept. Far past that, Qu’l-Nia finally reached her destination, where one of many seemingly innocuous orbs floated in an amniotic stasis among an obsidian desert. The vast skies were now as dark as midnight and in the infinite distance among the millions of stars shone the malevolent Dirge Star of Carthexi. It was a dark area that Qu’l-Nia usually knew to stay away from. She rested an arm atop one of the celestial orbs in front of her and attuned to its energy, searching for a pinpoint location among the billion trillion stars of the universe inside the orb, still following the trail left behind by her dear friend.

In the next moment, Qu’l-Nia—back in human form—found herself in a bright forest, surrounded by endless trees. Looking to her left, the woman came face to face with an enervated Alma who looked up at her from a crouching position on the ground. Her shoes and clothes were torn and crusted over with a layer of grey dust. A small pistol held firmly in her grasp. There was a cold, faraway look in her eyes.

“Q…? Is that really you?” She asked desperately. “How many years has it been?”

Qu’l-Nia stared back at her gravely. “This is no time for your jokes.”