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Echo begins to approach Clavia menacingly. She has been lying to him this
whole time, and worse than that, manipulating him. All of her lessons were
designed to turn him into the person that she wanted him to be.
Perhaps he really is some sort of ethereal god-like being, but he’s not a
tyrant. She instilled those values in him without him even knowing it, and
she’s going to pay.
“Wait,” she says, holding her hand up defensively. “You can’t hurt me.”
“Why not?” Echo asks.
“I am more powerful than you,” she replies.
“Then why did you come here? Why do you need me? What are you after?”
She sighs like she’s relenting. “I’m more powerful than you, but you are
still powerful. More to the point, you have power to give.”
“You’ve just been trying to take it? Is that even possible?”
Clavia smiles. “I don’t need the power in my own body,” she says with
airquotes. “If I control what you do with it, it’s the same as having
it for myself. Now, I’m being honest, and I’m sorry that I couldn’t before.
But we’ve barely scratched the surface of your studies. We’ve not had time
to get into the fine details of the world. I am what they call the Powers
That Be. I am here to help, but I’m still so limited. I’m reliant on
selecting human agents to do most things for me. In order to enact real
change, I have to unshackle myself from those restrictions. When I do that,
I’ll transform into the Power That is All. I came here...to ask for your
help...to change the universe for the better.”
“You wanna team up?” Echo questions. “You went about it the wrong way.”
“I see that now.”
“It’s too late.” Echo turns to Hogarth. “I was naïve, and stupid, but I’m
awake now, and I better understand my origins. My mother is a woman by the
name of Olimpia Sangster. I was hoping to find her.”
“I am familiar with her,” Hogarth replies, “but I don’t know where she is.
Last time I saw her, she was on a planet called Castlebourne, but that was
years ago from my perspective.”
“I appreciate it. I’ll start there, and continue looking.”
“You can’t leave this planet,” Clavia warns. “I would have gotten us out of
here a long time ago if you could. You are an extension of this place. You
and it are the only things that exist. That little shuttle of yours, the
suit; everything is just something that you contrived in your head to make
sense of your reality. But you are really just the planet itself. That’s why
you named it Echo.”
Echo was watching her as she talked, but now turns back to Hogarth. “Is this
true?”
“I have no idea. I don’t know what you are, or what this place is. I only
know that you’re a danger to a lot of people. I’m sorry to say...”
“No, I understand,” Echo admits. He steps away, and hops off the stage. He
walks a little ways down the curve of the hill, and begins to survey his
domain. He’s the planet. He made the planet. He needed a place to
stand, so he came up with something. But that’s not the only kind of thing
that people stand on. It never needed to be this big. Most of it is just
lifeless desert anyway, it’s not like his brain took the time to intricately
fabricate every single blade of grass in every part of the world. He
probably did a lot of copying and pasting just to get the basic structure
down. If this isn’t real, then it can be anything. He can turn it into
something more manageable. He takes a deep breath through his nose, closes
his eyes, and sinks down to the ground. He sits there, and focuses, but he
doesn’t concentrate. Instead, he lets go. He stops trying to keep this rock
alive, and just lets it fold in on itself, not all the way, but into a much
smaller shape. In only seconds, all that’s left is the hill, floating in the
void, protected by a bubble of air that he controls. He opens his eyes and
stands. “I am the god-being,” he says, as if explaining it to
Hogarth.
One of Hogarth’s friends hops over to the edge, and glides her finger along
the vacuum barrier. It ripples like water, and it kind of looks like she’s
tickled by it. “I was wrong, this will not do,” she says. “This is no place
for the next Garden Dimension. It’s too unstable and unsafe. We should
transplant the tree back where we were going to in the parallel dimension on
Earth.”
“I didn’t think this would be the place for the Garden, Princess,” another
woman says to her, “but we can’t just transplant a magical tree whenever we
want to.”
Princess Honeypea walks over to Echo. “The fruit. Have you tried it?” She
tilts her head over to Clavia’s tree.
“She told me that it would be sort of...intimate.”
“That may not have been a lie,” Princess says. “Her tree is different than
the one we had before. It may not work the same way, but if it does, it can
take you to your mother. Then perhaps you move the tree itself in return.”
Echo goes back up to Clavia. “Can it? Can it find my real mother?”
Clavia takes a moment. “It could take someone to her, but not you.
I’m not lying, you can’t leave, no matter how big or small this place is.
It’s the void. You were born in the void. You were born of the void.
It is here you must stay. You too would require human agents. If you had
started out as a normal human like me, you would have one exception, but I’m
afraid you’re too tied down.”
“Then what do you want from me?” Echo asks again. “I thought my power would
help you lift your own restrictions. I thought that was the point.”
Clavia hesitates to respond. “A child. If we had a child of our own, it
would be a million times stronger, and have the ability to leave.”
“The child of two gods,” Echo muses. “Sounds...like a monumentally stupid
idea, and a very irresponsible one.” This is getting out of hand, and Echo
is more confused than ever. He doesn’t know what to believe anymore. Even
though he knows that he can’t trust Clavia, he also can’t trust his own
mind. She’s not just been manipulating him, but brainwashing him too.
There’s so much up there in his brain. How much of it is just a way for her
to control him? He has to get rid of it. He has to get rid of it all.
“Are you okay?” one of the people asks him. “You look sad.”
“I’m dying,” Echo replies.
“That’s not possible,” Clavia decides.
“You’re dying too.”
“What?”
“You’re an amalgam of multiple people, some of which are here today in
alternate form.” He gestures towards the group as he’s walking towards her
again. “Your primary consciousness is that of a not-so-great person, but
that’s just because that was the one that was prepared for it. You
wanted to be in charge. I can put someone else in charge.”
“No,” Clavia argues. She looks to others for help. “You’re not gonna let him
do this, are you? It’s a violation. No! No!”
Echo doesn’t need to touch her, she can back away as much as he wants. He
closes his eyes again, and focuses on her mind. It’s all jumbled in there,
with a bunch of conflicting thoughts rattling around. As he’s snaking his
way through the amalgam, he realizes that it could be worse. It could be
just The First Explorer and no one else. At least the other minds in
there have been taming her thirst for power. She probably didn’t count on
that, but it means less work for him. It will make it easier for him to do a
little bit of rearranging. Just a tweak here, and a modification there.
And...go to sleep.
Clavia falls to the grass.
“Is she dead?” Hogarth asks.
“The one you knew as Clavia is, yes,” Echo explains, “but a new being will
awaken in her place.” He breathes deeply once more. “The same will go for
me.”
“Is that really necessary?” Princess Honeypea questions.
“It’s the only way to be sure,” Echo replies. “When I wake up, I won’t
understand any of this. I won’t know any of you. I’m trusting you to teach
me; to show me what life is really about, and how to be a good person. Sorry
to cut this short, but I hope that we can be friends in the next life.”
“None of us is qualified to do what you ask,” Hogarth contends.
“Like I said, I’m trusting you.” Before anyone can argue any further, Echo
shuts his eyes, and erases his whole mind. He too falls to the grass.
