Shana fell through darkness.
It had started as a sudden, lurching plummet, her hair whipping around her, her whole body flailing this way and that in a desperate battle for control.
But now, she had slowed. She fell, but it was more like she was falling through water, steadily sinking into unfathomable depths.
She could breathe. That was some comfort. But she could see nothing. There was nothing around her to feel. Not a single sound reached her ears, save sounds she herself made. And those were muffled, muted, strangely deadened.
“You don’t know what it is to be unmade. But you will.”
That was Yuryo’s plan. It started here, but Shana knew this wouldn’t be all there was. The sinking through darkness was just the prelude.
I have to stay alert. And I have to find my friends!
Yuryo hadn’t just threatened Shana. She’d threatened all of the Dawn Riders. So they were in here somewhere, too, trapped in a nightmare of Yuryo’s creation. They, too, must be sinking through darkness somewhere, somewhere Shana couldn’t reach.
But Shana didn’t do anything right now. She’d tried, three times, since her descent had slowed, to fly or swim through the darkness. She couldn’t. There was no way for her to control her trajectory, to arrest her descent, to choose where to go.
For now, Yuryo was in control.
In her heart, Shana could feel the dual presences of both Heart and the Eternal Flame. They were warm, reassuring. But they couldn’t help Shana. Not in any practical sense, anyway. Not now. There was something here, something about Yuryo’s creation, that kept them and Shana from exercising the Dreamer’s power.
I think…
That’s one more thing she’s afraid of, isn’t it? I’m the Dreamer. She thinks I’m the one person who can really threaten her plans.
She’s terrified. So frightened, through and through. By the past, and the present, and the future.
So what do I…
Her thoughts came to a halt as her feet touched solid ground. She stood shakily for a moment, her body unused to bearing its own weight. She took a few experimental steps, tried to gauge the ground’s shapes and texture, tried to gauge the size of the place she was now in.
The ground was solid, firm, and perfectly flat, like marble. But beyond that, she couldn’t tell anything else. All was darkness. Which was strange, because when she looked down at herself, she could see herself just fine. Not illuminated, there wasn’t some spotlight shining down on her, and she wasn’t glowing with her own light. She was simply visible. Which made this all the more eerie. Ground beneath her feet, but she couldn’t see it. Unknown space around her, sky above, but she couldn’t see them. No shadow for her to cast, no light for her to follow.
Alone in the dark.
She thought about walking. Just setting out into the unknown, finding something somewhere out there, but… she didn’t. She stood, still, waiting.
In that silence, in that solitude, she thought more about Yuryo’s threat.
To be unmade…
I’ve faced a lot of evils. I know fear, I know pain. It hasn’t been easy for me to stick to this path, to keep my chin up and soldier on. To keep returning to the fight. I already gave up once. Whatever she has waiting for me, it’s not going to make me give up again.
Images, memories, flashed through her mind. The Library of Solitude, first and foremost. Her lonely trial through the Dream Forge, each of the Princesses giving themselves up for the sake of the frightened Shana’s success. Through blood, and mud, and muck, she’d crawled at the end, barely hanging on.
It had taken a long time to recover from that.
Then there was the quest to save Nocta. She’d had Shias back with her for that, and she’d been able to work with Fae, too! Multiple trips along the Nightmare Road… watching Delilah fall away, lost to her fears… watching Chelsea nearly succumb to the darkness inside her, that mysterious Other.
Then, of course, most of all, was her waking Leon, putting an end to the Radiant King, waking the previous Dreamer from his final Dream. Being responsible for that… it had nearly broken her. For all its necessity, for all that she was the only one who could do it, for all that she gave to do it right, to go about it the right way, to be kind and compassionate without yielding the Dreamer’s Heart to him…
It had cut her to the core.
But here she was. Back again, at the end of it all.
Only it’s not the end for me. Just, well… what I have planned for after we stop the Endless Night will hopefully be a little less high-stakes. A little less intense. Settle in to normal Dreamer stuff.
Maybe it was silly to just stand here, waiting. But Shana found these reminiscences comforting. Hope for the future was something she’d struggled with plenty of times. But here she was, with a plan for what came after the prevention of the end of the world, and excited to get to it when the time came.
I won’t be unmade. Not here. Not by you.
Not by anyone.
Finally, a sound. Was it… yes. It sounded like footsteps.
Behind her! Shana spun around, immediately on guard…
And found herself face-to-face with her parents.
“Mom?” Shana asked, her voice catching in her throat. “Dad? How are you…”
It’s a dream.
“You were in danger,” Callum said, with that cheerful, lopsided grin of his. “You think we wouldn’t come running when our little girl’s in trouble?”
Shana struggled to breathe, struggled to find another word.
Because she knew, now. She knew Yuryo’s play.
Slowly, the darkness resolved into a nighttime scene. Grimoire. Crescent Avenue, one of Shana’s favorite shopping areas. Just her and her parents, here for a pleasant, lovely night out together.
“Shana?” Deirdre asked. “What’s wrong, honey? You look so pale.”
Shana took slow, deep breaths to steady herself. This was cruel, what Yuryo had planned. But it fit. Shana stood against her. In desperation, Yuryo sought to bring Shana to her level. She sought to make Shana understand, and through understanding, submit.
Okay. Time to meet your fears. Time to meet your pain.
Shadows emerged out of a nearby alley. Crescent Avenue was abandoned, which it never was, but this was Yuryo’s version. The shadows formed into men, who surrounded Callum, Deirdre, and Shana. Her parents stepped to either side of her, ready for a fight.
Shana reached deep within herself. She felt the warmth of Heart, of the Eternal Flame. They ached, as she ached, but they were here with her. They were on the same page.
No running from this. No fighting it.
The men gave their warnings. “Hand over the girl, and no one gets hurt.” Shana’s parents, of course, refused. Shana remained silent.
A fight erupted. Shana looked up, looked at the crescent moon high above, a pale, faint sliver of silver in the night sky.
The fight was over in moments. In real life, of course it would be — with her parents emerging easily victorious. But this was Yuryo’s nightmare, and in this horrid imagining, Shana’s parents were the ones dead on the ground.
Shana gave them each a quick glance. It was all she could muster. Dreams were more real than people gave them credit for, and there was nothing more horrid than having your parents dead at your feet.
The men approached Shana. Try as she might, Shana’s deep breathing was coming faster, shallower, more shaky than she wanted. She couldn’t help the fear that bubbled up inside of her.
A man reached out, grabbed her by the wrist, and started leading her away. Shana followed.
A moment later, the man was gone. All of the men were. So were the bodies of Shana’s parents, and the entire scene of nighttime Grimoire. All was darkness again.
“What are you doing?” Yuryo asked sharply.
Shana turned to see Yuryo standing behind her as a child. Her hands were balled into fists, her eyes were fixed on Shana in a glare of mingled rage and anguish. “Why would you just let them take you?” she asked.
Shana sucked in a breath, found her voice, and replied in a calm, even tone. “I’m not going to fight you.”
Confusion overtook Yuryo’s rage. “Why? You have power, you’re the Dreamer! If you really wanted, I couldn’t do a thing against you! This city, our hopes… all is as dust before you, if you really want. So why?”
Shana smiled, a small, empathetic smile. “I’m really not that powerful,” she said. “I’m not like Leon. I guess… power like that, power to just do what I want, to force people to stand aside, to force my will onto people who are hurting… it’s just not me.”
“I don’t…” Yuryo started. She shook her head, then stared at her feet, shoulders slumped.
Shana felt hope burst within her, bolstered by what she’d said. Her core ideals, core beliefs, that she hadn’t fully voiced before now, suddenly took shape. Who I am as the Dreamer. Who I choose to be. What all of this means to me. She took a step towards Yuryo. “I don’t really like power,” she said. “It’s so easily abused, so easily turned towards destroying or controlling people and places. Leon had big ideals, but he was so… prideful. He thought that he knew best, and everyone else should just fall in line. I can’t sit on a high throne and dictate what’s right to other people. That’s just not me. You’ve seen more destruction and oppression than I can ever imagine. For me, to be the Dreamer… it’s about reaching out. Not to control, but to understand, to hold a hand, to meet people where they are. Not to destroy, but to defend, to heal, to rebuild.”
Yuryo looked up at her, tears shining in her eyes. “You would have… you would have gone along with it,” she said softly. “Whatever I put you through. Willingly.”
“I thought, when everything I said before didn’t reach you, then maybe… maybe that was the only way to bridge this gap between us.” Shana took another step towards her. “Not that I wanted any of that. I was terrified. It would have been horrible. But… I wasn’t just going to abandon you.”
Yuryo stared at her. Shana stared back. She took another step closer. Close enough to reach out and touch her… but she stayed there. She didn’t reach out. She just looked at her, and waited.
“What light is left to guide you home?” Yuryo asked. She gestured at the darkness that surrounded them. “I’ve seen your mind. Shias… Altair… those have been your beacons. But they’re both gone to you this time. I may have made this darkness, but I… I can’t get myself out of it.”
“Do you want to get out of it?” Shana asked. She held out her hand, halfway between her and Yuryo.
“How?” Yuryo asked. “If you, as the Dreamer, don’t have the kind of power you should, then how are you going to get us out of here by yourself?”
“I’m never by myself,” Shana said. “It’s taken me a long time to see it, but I’m never really alone. No matter where I am, no matter how dark it gets, I’ve found that I’m always…”
“Always what?” Yuryo asked.
Shana smiled. “Halfway out of the dark.”
Yuryo reached out, hesitantly, and took Shana’s hand with a light, tentative grip. Both girls started, turning to stare as, far in the distance, a tiny star glimmered to life. Shana looked at Yuryo, and Yuryo looked back at her, and then both of them started forward, hand in hand. Shana let Yuryo set the pace, walked right beside her, didn’t rush her, didn’t pull her. She didn’t grip Yuryo’s hand any tighter than Yuryo gripped hers.
It was a long walk, and even then, when they finally reached the tiny white star, it was no larger, no brighter, than it had seemed from a great distance. Just a tiny light, twinkling in the darkness. The girls stopped before the light, and then, out from the center of the star, a hand emerged. Shana looked down at Yuryo. When Yuryo met her gaze with a questioning look, Shana nodded.
Slowly, nervously, Yuryo reached for the hand. When she finally took it, the hand held her firmly, and started to pull her through the light. And as Yuryo was pulled into the light, she then pulled Shana with her.
The pair emerged into another field of darkness. But it wasn’t as dark as the field they’d left. There was a faint differentiation between ground and sky, a parting line of shadow.
And with them was Kathryn, holding Yuryo’s hand and beaming at the pair of them. No words were needed. A new star blossomed ahead of them, and the three walked together towards it. When they reached it, and a hand reached out from the light, Kathryn and Shana nodded to Yuryo, and she went first, taking the hand and pulling the others through after her.
A new field of darkness, but lighter than the last, awaited them. There was little to see in this barren land, but being able to see some of its shapes and contours helped chase away the fear brought on by the endless, suffocating dark.
The hand that had brought them here was Annabelle’s, and she walked with them towards the next star. The twinkling beacon guided their way across the barren land, and there a new hand reached for them. Yuryo, with growing confidence, took this hand faster than the last, more tightly than the last, and pulled the others through after her. Rae met them on the other side, and together the five girls walked towards the next star across a lighter landscape.
The final hand to pull them on was Ben’s, joining them on a new landscape. Before them stretched a pale, winding road under a soft velvet midnight sky. Far ahead they could see the end, a cloudy archway that glimmered with a soft pink-and-blue glow.
Yuryo led the way, not hesitantly now, but not fully confident, either. Shana thought there was something more like resignation in her poise and bearing, in the firm direction of her steps as she walked the long road.
They reached the archway. It was wide enough to accommodate all of them, so the six of them stood, side-by-side. All eyes went to Yuryo.
It was her choice. Hers to take the first step.
After one final hint of hesitation, Yuryo stepped forward, and the rest of them followed. Out of the darkness, and into a city in the clouds beneath a bright blue sky. The Palette in the Clouds as it lived on in Yuryo’s memories, as it had once been.
“I’m fighting for this, too,” Shana said. “It’s a beautiful dream. But a dream —”
“Is meant to be woken from,” Yuryo said. Firmly, but not happily.
Shana shook her head. “I was going to say, some dreams are meant to be woken to.” Yuryo gazed up at her, the question in her eyes. “I’m not fighting to protect this memory, but to revive it. To heal what’s been hurt. To rebuild what’s been torn down. Not all dreams exist solely in Dreamworld. You have the heart to make this real. You have people behind you, people who all desire the same beautiful home to feel safe and loved in again. You don’t really want to remain in Dreamworld. Don’t let fear keep you from restoring what you’ve lost. Wake to that dream. Bring it with you to the waking world. I promise you, it’s more beautiful there than it can ever be here.”
Yuryo gave her an appraising look. “I… may be willing to try,” she said. “If you’ll help me.”
Shana smiled. “I’d love to,” she said.
“Not just her, either,” Kathryn said with a grin. “We’ll all help. Right, Benjamin?”
“Sure will,” Ben said, not missing a beat.
“In whatever way we can,” Rae said with a nod.
Annabelle matched that nod. “I can bring help from the Library of Solitude,” she said. “You’ll have everything you need.”
“You’ll never be alone again,” Shana said. “So… what do you say?” She held out her hand.
“I say…” Yuryo paused, taking one long, lingering look at the city of her dreams. “I say it’s time to wake up.” She took Shana’s hand. “Turn the Key. End the Night, end the Dream. Help us all, at last, to go home.”