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Chaos, oftentimes, is fundamentally misunderstood as a concept. Yes, being the antithesis to order—something so just and pure in nature—often leads to a bit of a... negative stigma surrounding the concept of chaos, but that does not mean that it is inherently bad.
But as Bae peers over an unseen horizon, marveling at the death and despair that rages across the war-torn world the Council keeps watch over, she finds she cannot in good conscience deny that what she has wrought upon the Earth is despicable.
And so, Chaos waits over the unseen horizon, marveling at destruction overcast by a galaxy of flickering lights, and waits for Hope to descend.
When they first meet, Bae and IRyS could not hate each other more. They are oil and water, viscous and burning and heavy against each other in a way that sets an uncomfortable pressure squarely in the back of their minds and the tips of their tongues.
Chaos, the degradation of all into disorder, and a Nephilim heralding hope, ushering order. Diametrically opposed existences, much to the amusement of the rest of the Council. Their arguments are often petty and meaningless, stretching who knows how long into the night or unbearably early into the morning. The two become their own worst and best company, a sparring partner for the ages.
They meet often, paths intersecting as they go to and fro, meeting and separating, chaos and hope weaving tangled webs that humans learn to simply call “life.” They fight in the ways they scatter their existence across the world, they laugh in the face of the other’s follies and wave fists at each other across ends of the conflict. They exist at a constant crossroads, pushing and pulling, and while they could not hate each other more when they first met, they are far from their first meeting now, and their hatred is now more akin to rivalry than anything.
‘It’s like you two are made for each other,’ Bae remembers Mumei crooning from her spot, nestled under an uninterested Kronii’s embrace, arms wrapped loosely around the taller woman’s waist while the Warden stares nowhere and everywhere, the threads of time winding around her a constant companion and more constant irritation. Mumei’s eyes scream a challenge.
Bae and IRyS scoff incredulously, twin pouts adorning anger-flushed faces. Bae goes to open her mouth, but Kronii lifts a single imperious eyebrow at her, daring her to refute Mumei under threat of condescension. The owl’s lips curl into a smirk.
‘Screw all of you,’ Bae says, throwing her hands in the air, and a middle finger at IRyS specifically. A moment later, trailed by an indignant ‘Hey!’ from the Nephilim, she disappears in a crimson shimmer of air. She has better things to do.
Oftentimes, however, Bae has precisely nothing to do. IRyS is Hope, IRyS is order bestowed upon those whom Bae has dealt their life’s hand to, and while she works and toils at the betterment of the world, Bae is simply left to struggle feebly against the creation of paradise.
‘No matter,’ she thinks to herself amid the monotony. ‘It’ll be my turn eventually.’
IRyS ascends, and Bae almost wishes she could drag her down and give her a thorough lashing for the utter mess she had left behind.
“Paradise my toned rat ass,” Bae snarls as she pushes another thread of fate down into messy knots and tangles it with the rest of them. Chaos is overworked, and cranky, and tired. IRyS was always an optimist in her methodology. She gave and gave, she spread love and hope and order and structure, and the humans built higher and higher until their foundation could no longer handle the weight of their hubris. They fell, as they were always meant to, as entropy demanded of the fragile system of their lives.
A pebble causes ripples, but a boulder causes waves, and unfortunately for Bae, she is in charge of hefting veritable tidal waves of disorder in the wake of humanity’s fall.
Millenia race by in a blur of rising and falling civilizations, of plagues and war and strife, and Bae leads, a chariot tangling behind her the fate of humanity. She does not revel in the pain caused by her actions, does not celebrate the way Mumei seems to twist away from her, the way she must hurt her and her people, but she is Chaos, and while she is not intrinsically evil, evil is simply what chaos often drags out of the dark heart of mankind.
Millennia crawl by in a sickening silence that Bae cannot acknowledge for fear of what it reveals about her. Bae follows, a carriage dragged forward by the trail of hope IRyS left behind, and undoes what she spent her entire existence laying down, drags her rickety wooden wheels in deep troughs over the soil IRyS laid lifetimes ago. She revels at first, in how direct this work is in its animosity towards the Nephilim, but the entertainment grows stale, begins to leave an ashen taste in Bae’s mouth, and before long she begins to grieve every painstakingly planted seed she must unearth.
Millennia pass, and Bae realizes, not for the first time, and not for the last, that she misses the way IRyS’ existence seemed to mesh so seamlessly with hers.
Bae’s feet beat a frantic rhythm against the pure-nothing platform of the Council’s meeting space, her breaths heaving from her mad dash towards the sliver of light shining a spotlight onto the floor.
Bae is Chaos. She is the very concept of disorder, her power waxes and wanes with the randomness of the world, and she knows, better than anyone else on the Council ever could, earlier than anyone else ever could, when a paradigm shift is coming.
Hope descends once again, and Bae is there to meet her with a fire in her eyes, in the quirk of her lip, flaring and rushing in her chest. It has been ever so boring without her.
“IRyS!” Bae exclaims and jumps at the Nephilim, eyes only barely open after her angelic descent, crashing together in a tangle of limbs, yells, and laughter. The Nephilim sits up with a groan and places a hand over Bae’s face, pushing it away. Bae, nonetheless, remains atop IRyS, straddling the taller woman’s waist.
“Is that really any way to greet a girl after she’s just woken up, you stupid rat?” IRyS says, but her voice is softer than Bae remembers. Her annoyance is a simmer, warm and still most definitely there, but not the hatred they had harbored in their humble origins.
A faraway, closed-off part of Bae wonders—hopes, even, that IRyS has missed her too.
“Oh whatever, you big baby,” Bae says, lifting herself up off the floor and offering IRyS a helping hand. The Nephilim stares for just a moment, then grabs it, and allows herself to be pulled to her feet, landing feather-soft against Bae’s side.
They stand there, pressed together, breath mingling for just a moment before Bae’s smile turns sinister. IRyS flushes a faint red.
“You're gonna be paying me back for all the trouble you made for me when you left last time,” Bae says, the echoes of the rest of the Council’s footsteps drifting through this liminal space made just for all of them. Bae was the first to notice, but all of them were now certainly aware that IRyS was back, and for some reason, Bae longs to keep this little moment all to themselves.
“Your first payment starts now: do you know of a little game the humans invented called Monopoly?”
The following years are a whirlwind in all the best and worst ways.
IRyS, as Bae once had, was forced to dive into her duties as the harbinger of Hope almost immediately and was occupied with said duties almost indefinitely. Hakos Baelz is many things, but let it be known now and forever that lazy is not one of them. Thousands of years of human destruction and despair were hoisted upon IRyS for her to untangle, thousands of years of Bae’s hard work and cunning nudging were hers to heal and mend.
In short, Bae and IRyS do not meet again for a hundred years.
Yes, their lives become entwined in that curious way it had always been in the past, and yes, they did end up playing a frustratingly long game of Monopoly along with the rest of the Council—which, surprisingly enough, Fauna absolutely decimated everyone save Mumei in—but these are all the movings and rumblings of Hakos Baelz the embodiment of Chaos and IRyS the Nephilim, and not... not Bae and IRyS. Not whatever it is the two of them are outside of their powers and duties.
But in the end, a century passes, and IRyS manages to drag humanity from the brink of self-destruction once again. She is more cautious this time, however. She still gives of herself plenty, she still loves humanity dearly and she still ushers them into brighter tomorrows, but she gives her past mistakes a wide berth. She keeps humanity’s hubris in check, even if it means she must keep herself and her gift from them from time to time.
Bae rules over these pockets devoid of hope with a gentle hand. Chaos has bred wars in the past, yes, but now chaos breeds revolution. Bae moves in the wake of IRyS’ shadow, weaving together plots and mischief that grow into wisdom and righteous anger and tyrants overthrown and status quos broken. Hope and Chaos spread across the land in a mad dance that only the two of them know, and in a century the world reaches something akin to peace—to balance.
And in a century, IRyS and Bae afford themselves time to rest.
It is a curious thing, to mingle in the world you have spent your entire existence looking over. To walk among the fruits of your labor, to see seeds painstakingly cared for grown into sturdy oaks and fragrant flowers.
Bae lifts her arms over her head in a satisfying stretch, shaking a crick in her neck off with a satisfying pop, and swinging her legs over the edge of a sturdy, metal-framed bunk bed. Bae climbs the first few steps to the top bunk through half-lidded eyes and stops when they catch on the sleeping figure nestled in deep maroon blankets and ivory sheets.
Crystalline wings catch the early morning sun in a cascade of deep purple motes that reflect across the ceiling of their apartment. Waves of burgundy scatter across the pillows on IRyS’ mattress, and Bae finds herself thinking that it is not very often that she is treated to a sight that makes her believe, fully and truly, that there is a part of IRyS that is meant to be ethereally beautiful, bathed in light like a real, honest-to-goodness angel.
But illusions exist to be broken, and Bae has a demon to raise.
“Waaaaaaaaake up, sleepy head!” Bae yells through cupped hands, drawing an indignant yelp from the blanket-covered, dubious mass of IRyS, immediately followed by a groan.
“God, you’re absolutely insufferable in the mornings, you know that?” The Nephilim mutters darkly, shoving a pillow at Bae, who catches it in between snickers at IRyS’ expense. The shorter woman hops down the few ladder rungs below her onto plush carpet and throws the pillow back.
“C’mon IRyS sweetie. Descend upon us lowly mortals. Grant us thine holy gift of hope and light, oh wonderful angel of—ow!” Bae is cut off by second pillow hitting her squarely in the face, and this time the room fills with the sound of a sleepy chuckle from the now half-awake IRyS.
“Yeah, yeah I heard you the first hundred times you gave me this speech, I’m up,” she says, mouth opening wide in a yawn before her eyes zero in, half-lidded, on Bae.
Shimmering wings, stained reflections on the roof, gentle smile, early morning sun framing her in a soft halo of light. The very picture of an angel.
Bae curses her traitorous heart, beating a drum roll in her chest.
“What do you want for breakfast?” IRyS asks, and food has ever been the way into Bae’s heart. Witch, succubus, sinner and temptress and demon that she is, IRyS gets down from the bunk and starts making her way to the kitchen of their shared apartment. Bae stares for all of a moment before dashing into action, movement to distract from the skipped beat of a butterfly thrashing in her ribcage.
“I want waffles! And don’t you dare put raisins in the mix again this time!”
Bae is Chaos. She is the very concept of disorder, her power waxes and wanes with the randomness of the world, and she knows, better than anyone else on the Council ever could, earlier than anyone else ever could, when a paradigm shift is coming.
But Bae isn’t used to someone else knowing too.
Centuries after Bae and IRyS’ knife-edge balance was finally, painstakingly achieved, mankind proves once again its proclivity for the cyclical. Natural resources run out, technology advances too far, too fast. Wars are waged and cities destroyed, and Bae must shoulder the burden of conducting humanity’s swan song as they drive themselves to extinction.
But most important of all, Bae must shoulder the realization that IRyS is leaving soon.
Hope is not a purely human emotion, but IRyS is not a concept like the rest of Council. She is an in-between, a harbinger, but not a creator, and as such, much of her existence is directly tethered to those she bequeathed her gift to, to the humans who Bae sees kill and be killed every day waging wars the two of them had spent a century trying to avoid.
Days grow longer under acrid, dusk-filled skies, and IRyS slowly recedes into herself. She is disheartened, disappointed in what she believed to be her incompetence. Bae assures her, over and over again, that she is not at fault, that things like this simply happen. Bae whispers platitudes into IRyS’ ears while she leads the world to destruction, and the irony of it is painful in the worst ways.
They both know, when they wake up on their final day together, that IRyS will ascend come the next dawn.
Bae wakes up early as usual, stretches, swings her feet out over the bottom bunk, but does not wake IRyS like she has so many times before, letting the angel sleep in for once.
The sizzle of bacon on a hot pan. Eggs whisked and scrambled until fluffy. The ding of a toaster followed by the subtle scrape of a butter-laden knife across golden brown bread. Porcelain plates clatter as they are placed on a simple wooden tray, the one they would use for meals in bed while one of them was sick. Splatters of some old, long-dried soup broth mar the wooden surface, and Bae cannot help but drag a finger along the splotch, remembering IRyS’ laughter as Bae feebly attempted to lead a spoon to her mouth with shaky hands.
‘Here, you big frickin’ baby,’ IRyS jeers fondly, carefully spooning some soup and chicken chunks together. She cups a hand under the silverware and brings it carefully to Bae’s mouth. ‘Now, open wide!’
Bae flushes, but opens her mouth, closing her lips around what she will swear for the rest of existence was the best soup of her life.
Maybe because she was sick. Maybe because IRyS fed it to her. No one’s forcing her to give honest answers here, anyways.
Bae carries the hearty breakfast back to their room and finds IRyS blearily blinking back at her from the top bunk, shadows under her eyes. Bae freezes for a moment, caught in the act, and it is a testament to their relationship thus far that it is disarming, almost embarrassing, to be caught doing something so blatantly... thoughtful.
Bae lifts up the tray, and IRyS hesitates for a moment before grabbing it in slow, measured movements, careful as to not jostle the food overmuch.
For a moment, Bae simply stands there, wringing her hands together and hoping, pleading that she is doing something right here. IRyS stares, half-lidded eyes zeroing in on Bae, a curtain of red-tinged light flickering onto alabaster wings, reflecting into soft pinks that wink in and out of existence around the room.
“C’mere, you stupid rat,” IRyS says after a moment of tense silence, shuffling into the corner of her bunk and patting the small open spot beside her. “We both know what’s happening, so just... humor me, please?”
Bae despises how IRyS sounds, defeated and disheartened. She hates the pleading smile thrown her way. She hates how IRyS feels she must beg Bae for comfort when Bae has wanted nothing more than to make IRyS happy for centuries.
Bae carefully climbs the ladder to IRyS’ bunk, metal rungs still cold against her socks. Maroon and ivory sheets, soft to the touch, even after hundreds of years of use, glide across Bae’s hands. It feels like her senses are kicked into overdrive; every moment singed into her nerves. IRyS lifts the tray above her head so Bae can settle in beside her, then gently lowers it back down, resting it above their legs.
IRyS forks food into her mouth slowly, the half-daze of early morning still hanging heavy over her. Every other bite, the Nephilim slowly lifts the fork to Bae’s lips, and while she hesitates at first, Bae starts sharing the breakfast she had made for IRyS with her.
It is... something. There is something about this that Bae and IRyS cannot seem to really understand. Something about the domesticity, about the care that they are putting forth towards each other in this moment, that baffles the two of them.
They have known each other since time immemorial, since mankind made and destroyed its Paradise, since before war plagued this world and clouds of sulfur threatened to blot out the burning red sun, heat coiling in angry waves as the star enters a deadly adolescence.
Breakfast is finished, and Bae, ever serviceable, lifts the tray, intending to take it back to the kitchen to wash. IRyS’ hand lands in a vice grip around her wrist before she makes it too far. Her eyes waver, heterochrome orbs fearful.
“Could you... could you come back, when you’re done?” IRyS mutters shakily. “Up here with me, I mean.”
Bae sets the tray down once more, then wraps a hand around IRyS’, still on her wrist. She slowly, softly releases the Nephilim’s grip, then laces their fingers together, giving IRyS’ hand a soft squeeze.
“Of course,” Bae whispers.
They spend the day nestled in IRyS’ sheets.
They keep a small tablet between them playing an old show, older technology than what was currently available, but they’d never been too picky or keen on upgrading. Immortals were creatures of habit, and they were quite used to their 21st century toys at this point. At some point, IRyS drops her head against the top of Bae’s, and despite the hammering of her heart, despite the goosebumps running across her arms, Bae does not say anything, does not back off, does not deny IRyS the simplest of comforts, the warmth she seeks.
An arm slowly, carefully loops around IRyS’ waist, drawing them closer together. Bae feels like her fingertips are coated in flames wherever they meet IRyS. They pass the time in comfortable silence, broken only by the long-forgotten show droning on and on, tablet perched across pressed-together thighs.
The day passes slowly and quietly.
Bae says nothing when IRyS wraps an arm around her in return.
Bae says nothing when the Nephilim nestles her head in the crook of her neck, even when ebony horns poke her every now and again.
Bae says nothing when quiet sobs wrack IRyS’ frame, the taller woman seeming so small in her arms.
“I love you,” IRyS says, and Bae’s breath hitches. “I don’t want you to say anything back, when we both know we’ll probably never see each other again, but... but I needed you to know that I love you, Bae.”
Bae holds IRyS closer; temptress, sinner, seducer, cruel demon that she is, giving Bae love that she is not at liberty to return.
But Bae grants her this request too.
And as dawn arrives, and IRyS disappears in a slow flicker of light, as her weight lifts from her shoulder, her arms leave her side, as her weight dips off the mattress and the warmth of her fades to a biting cold, even then, Bae says nothing too.
Hope abandons humanity.
The dregs of mankind struggle feebly against their folly, settlements scuttling around like cockroaches amidst ashy dunes and the ruins of old cities. They are nothing if not hardy, humanity, but their determination is overshadowed by the enormity of the apocalypse.
Bae walks among one such ruin, mind trapped in a haze she has tried unsuccessfully to find a way out of for the gods only know how long. She drags behind her, as always, a tangled mess of fate, erosion and chaos jumbled together so tightly it almost hurts just to look at it, like a coiled spring fit to snap, a ball of rubber bands, frayed threads holding it together by the thinnest of margins.
IRyS guffaws at Bae’s watermelon-laden face, totally uncaring for the mess of red slathered across their kitchen, the roof of their kitchen, and arguably most importantly, Bae’s face.
‘I told you that last rubber band would be the one that broke it, but you just had to be an ass about it, huh?’ the Nephilim jeers between laughs.
Bae scoffs, dragging watermelon down her face, but IRyS is smiling in that way that makes the corner of her eyes crinkle, that leaves her voice ringing in soft echoes across the crappy acoustics of their apartment, and she cannot find it in her to be angry.
Bae shakes the vestiges of the memory away. Pathetic that she is, that the mention of anything related to IRyS sends her down these winding paths. She was doomed from the beginning—hopeless romantic that she is—having lived so long with IRyS. They experienced too much together, lived through so much together, that almost anything reminded Bae of ebony horns, ivory sheets.
Bae’s foot catches on a fallen metal beam, and she hisses in pain, holding the throbbing toe, before glaring at the inanimate offender. Her eyes catch on something, a sliver of pale white against the dull, all-consuming brown of the world around her. A paper airplane rests, miraculously untouched under the ruins. Bae grabs it with gentle hands, undoing the carefully worn folds.
There is a wish written there, something about wanting to meet someone again, strokes shaky but hopeful. The sight brings tears to Bae’s eyes that she quickly paws away with her free hand. Bae carefully, lovingly folds the paper airplane back to its original shape, then tucks it under the metal beam once again.
Hope, she has learned, is a beautiful, precious thing, and she dares not squander the scattered remains of it left across this shattered world.
Bae walks on, heart lighter than it has been in years, and continues to weave her thread over a doomed world.
Bae kicks her legs idly through the expanse of space, perched on the nothing-platform the Council has used since their genesis.
She had almost forgotten, throughout her thousands of years on Earth, what it felt like to look down upon the world she lived in. Had forgotten how unbearably small it all felt.
She hated it, at first, looking at the world from so far away after years engulfed in it, wrapped in its embrace, trapped in its fog. She hated how her woes seemed to shrink with time and distance, hated how moving on felt less like progress and more like betrayal.
She was angry, later. At who, or what, Bae cannot really remember, but the fury gripped her so tightly at times that she would see nothing but red, a red sun expanding across worlds, burning away the husks of her home and her grief, red blood splattered across the streets of her old city, red skies cast through a half-open window on alabaster wings. She cast her wide net over the universe, during this time. She pushed and pulled at the strings of causality like playthings, as if holding the universe hostage in the grasp of infinite possibility and rampant randomness could fulfill her desperate need for peace.
She despairs, soon after. Her anger burns bright but not long, a minute-long inferno that leaves her feeling hollowed out. Emptiness proves to be a heavier load than anger ever was, and Bae carries it for the longest of her emotions. She leaves the universe to its devices, hands the reins to no one at all and leaves her work unfinished with something akin to pride.
(‘Chaos, bitch,’ she thinks to herself idly. There is no bite. The words ring empty and dull, and Bae finds the irony so beautifully painful that she almost cries, staring out over some far-off corner of the galaxy at strange, dead planets.
Bae is tired.
Bae heads home.)
She returns to little fanfare, but not none. Kronii and Sana greet Bae with pained smiles and knowing eyes. They give her time and space, hilariously enough, for the angry gashes across her heart to scar over.
Bae never dares to think that they do not know what she is going through. Owl feathers tucked carefully, lovingly behind Kronii’s ears, a potted flower resting in a beautiful glass vase, impossibly bright. Sketchbooks stacked in corners, opened to random pages, sometimes a sprawling scenery, sometimes Sana’s thousand-watt smile, aimed at someone unseen behind the lovingly traced lines.
Bae is not the only one to have loved and lost. It is reassuring in the worst ways.
Now, staring at the clumps of a broken solar system, dust and debris slowly, ever-so-slowly binding to each other, crashing together and breaking apart, pressurizing and heating into what may one day become a star, Bae does something she has kept from herself for an epoch.
Bae lifts her feet onto the platform, and shaky fingers reach out into the unknown.
Bae grabs hold of a single, frayed thread, and she dares to hope.
Sana holds the child star in her embrace like a mother true. She holds it gently, feeds it dying planets and dead stars, long-cooled comets and pure, blazing heat. A Sun grows out of Sana’s embrace, and she weeps as it flies, a mother hen to the end. She loves it dearly, bright thermal purples mixed into the glowing yellow in a way only her eyes can see.
Kronii watches over the star across the span of eons. The traveling child wanders, gathering unto itself a small system of meteors and asteroids. No one has to know how many times this beautiful Sun has died, how many millions of things must be fixed and prodded into place for its continued existence. Kronii will make sure no one does.
Bae gathers the reins into her hands and waits.
Fauna’s return is tearful and beautiful.
She is not the Fauna they knew; she is dark hues and troughs of fire burn in her veins, she is scared and angry, but she is alive and that is more than any of them could have hoped for.
Millennia race by in the long process of trial and error. Fauna blooms into herself at some point, crags of molten lava cooling, soft greens and lush horns and blossoming flowers springing up like so many memories. Kronii hugs her fiercely, holds her like she will never again let her go, and Fauna smiles as she gives her a flower of navy blue.
‘That old thing needs a rest, don’t you think?’ she tells Kronii, nodding her head at the impossibly bright bloom in a stained crystal vase, smiling softly. Kronii says she doesn’t care and puts them in the same vase, where they can catch the light of their child star in the distance.
Mumei’s return goes much the same.
They can scarcely believe this is not the same Mumei they have always known. She harbors the same forgetfulness, the same soft tones and tinkling laughs. She pops into existence and she hugs Fauna and Kronii and tells them she is sorry she overslept. The happiness radiating off them is palpable.
Millennia crawl by in an excruciating wait that leaves Bae jittery, constantly on edge and shaky. Humanity grows and prospers once more, spreading across strange new continents and charting beautiful new waters. They settle into cities and build their monuments unbearably slow, in Bae’s eyes. They are a fledgling species still, knowing nothing but progress, doing nothing but thriving.
The Council gathers, and 4 pairs of eyes land squarely on Hakos Baelz, Chaos itself, nestled into every inch of progress ever made, for entropy is essential, for it is not without the continued rolling of the die of fate that so many past conditions have been met for this moment to exist. The Council greets her with smiles, encouraging pats, firm grips on her shoulder. Kronii and Sana hug her, imbue in her the strength to begin anew.
“Teach my children a lesson, Bae,” Mumei says.
Bae snaps the reins; the chariot springs forward.
Chaos, oftentimes, is fundamentally misunderstood as a concept. Yes, being the antithesis to order—something so just and pure in nature—often leads to a bit of a... negative stigma surrounding the concept of chaos, but that does not mean that it is inherently bad.
But as Bae peers over an unseen horizon, marveling at the death and despair that rages across the war-torn world the Council keeps watch over, she finds she cannot in good conscience deny that what she has wrought upon the Earth is despicable.
‘You’d make a horrible mother,’ Mumei says with knowing eyes and a teasing smile.
‘You told me to teach them a lesson,’ Bae answers indignantly, and it draws a laugh from the owl. She stares out at the sight of all she is crumbling under its own weight.
‘It will work,’ Mumei says, Bae’s fears and heart worn on her sleeve.
‘Now teach my children to hope, Bae.’
Bae startles out of her memories when she feels a tug at the very back of her being. It is like something has started pushing against her in the subtlest way.
Bae rushes to her feet, heart frenzying in her ribcage, and looks around the platform overlooking this new Earth. A spotlight shines down from the very heavens near Bae, and it is all she can do to look up, awed and terrified, cradling the flickering flame in her chest fiercely.
Alabaster and onyx wings that reflect the shine of Sana’s new sun in little diamond and obsidian shards across the nothingness of the platform. Waves of flowing maroon fluttering in an invisible wind over sun-kissed skin.
Bae lifts her hands to the light, almost a prayer, almost worship, and Hope descends into her waiting arms.
“I love you too,” Bae whispers fervently, almost feverishly, into the hollow of IRyS’ neck, spinning her elatedly in her arms. The Nephilim lets out a choked laugh, arms winding around Bae’s shoulders loosely, hands caressing the back of her head lovingly.
“I’m back, little rat,” the Nephilim says, and it is all that Bae has ever dreamed of over the last eternity. The candle in Bae’s chest flares like a firestorm, warms her from the inside out until she feels like the sun itself. This fragile thing she has kept in her heart sings for joy, hope suffusing throughout her strong and true.
“Welcome back, my hope.”