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"That was five years ago," Inlé said as he laid back in a red leather long chair in the Psychiatrist's office. Inlé was there retelling the story to this new doctor, knowing full well that he, like every other psychiatrist Inlé had ever visited would think it only a dream, would write it off as some subconscious need being brought to the fore. Let them think so, was his thought.

The doctor sat in his armchair beside the single arm of Inlé's own seat, himself just above Inlé's head. "Very interesting, Inlé. I've never heard of a dream quite like it. Now, you say you first had it five years ago, when you were eleven?"

"Twelve, but just barely. And I have had it every once in a while ever since." That much was true. Inlé remembered it in dream almost regularly. Almost, but never when it was really expected.

Looking back at himself, Inlé was surprised at how much he had changed in just five years. He remembered back to when he regularly wore a pair of blue jeans and a sports shirt, complemented by a shaved head to made showers faster. Even then he'd hated water.

Collecting a mental image of himself now, his hair had become almost as long as his arm. Almost as long as that of the man in his dream. He kept it tied up in a topknot, letting it hang so long as it stayed out of his face. His attire was also different: Black knee-shorts and a black tee-shirt, neither with any markings on them, with an orange hooded sweatshirt over the tee, tattooed with various sigils and designs. Inlé knew all too well that he was not who he once had been.

"Yes, and does any of this dream ever change?" The doctor asked, looking down at Inlé with one eye through those small, round, fish-eye lens that so many in his profession seem to have.

"No," Inlé replied. It never did.

The doctor put the pad onto his lap, as though he were being more attentive. Or wanted Inlé to think so. "And do you ever act on this dream or on any others you may have?"

"Would I be here if I did not?"

"No," he sighed, "I suppose not." He shifted again, "So then, the question is rather how have you acted on these dreams?"

Inlé's arm being across his eyes, he couldn't see what the doctor was doing, but knew he was preparing to jot down whatever Inlé was about to say. He was audio-recording this, their first session, but still he jotted notes. At least he was interested in actually helping, Inlé considered, even if he thought Inlé was just a crazy kid.

"Well," Inlé began, "I guess it all started around a week after I first had the dream. I disappeared for about three days and had everyone worried. I had no recollection of disappearing, just of going to the bathroom. It all went downhill from there.

"For a few months, I would disappear every time I did something alone. Sometimes I would be gone for minutes, sometimes for days. On a few occasions, I wound up in different places. You know, when weird stuff happens to you like that, people start to shun you.

"Even old friends."

"Well, that's a very interesting story," the psychiatrist said, after a pause. "But dreams are dreams. How could they cross over into reality?"

"Well," Inlé tried, "what about memories being repeated?"

He paused, "So this actually happened to you, do you believe?"

"No," Inlé answered, "that would be crazy. You know, like not existing when others are not around. I was just pointing out when dreams and reality cross paths."

"But that's just reminiscing, not dreaming." Though the doctor rarely meant to sound condescending, (as now he only meant to kindly correct,) his voice had an aggravatingly strong tone to it that made him sound as though he were perpetually looking down on whomever he spoke with.

Inlé asked, "Even when asleep?"

"Even then," He reaffirmed.

Inlé sat up, turning to look at his psychiatrist. It was then that Inlé realized how young he was. Appearing to be in his mid-to-late thirties, the doctor's hair wasn't yet graying, though the stress of this job was already wearing on him. His face was lined with worries one outside the profession couldn't begin to imagine, many of them not originally his own. His brown hair was balding, or rather had already become bald from brow to the back of the head, leaving a wide band around the sides, but nothing on top. It fit him, making him seem more like Freud than if he'd grown a large beard in place of the delicate horn goatee he sported. The similarity between he and Freud stopped there, though. He did not smell at all of cigar smoke, and did not look as though he'd ever prescribed himself cocaine.

"Well doctor," Inlé began, rising to his feet, "thank you for your time. I know I can be a bore with my stories."

"Oh, no," he said. "That was more interesting than most of my appointments for today promise to be. You can schedule your next one in the lobby with Tanya."

Inlé tried, though he knew the answer, "Will I need another appointment?"

The doctor sounded more surprised at the idea than Inlé expected. "Won't you?"

Inlé shrugged and headed for the door. "Yeah, you are right. If I do not schedule myself, my mother or the police will, correct?"

He answered, "Only until things are sorted out. You need to be patient. You've caused a lot of trouble lately, Inlé. It only makes sense that they would seek to intervene."

Inlé pulled the office door closed behind himself. "Yeah ... I know."

Tanya at reception looked, in Inlé's opinion, like an average ditz. The cliché secretary: a busty blonde with blue eyes, she at least made a nice little eye-catch for anyone coming in. She looked young, but Inlé didn't care enough about most people to look closely unless absolutely necessary.

She chattered for a short while before Inlé started listening.

"... so the twenty-sixth is good?"

"Yeah," Inlé said.

She typed something into the computer before her. "Around three p.m.-ish?"

"Yeah," Inlé said.

She looked up at Inlé. "Wow, you're easy."

Unable to tell if it was a compliment, an insult or a question, Inlé paused just a moment before deciding to safely answer, "Yeah."

Tanya leaned over the desk toward him. "Are you available around six-ish that night?"

"Yeah," Inlé said.

She smiled. "You wanna go see a movie? I get out at ..."

"Yeah," he cut her off.

She pouted. "Are you even listening?"

"Yeah," Inlé said. "Twenty-sixth, three p.m. Movie at six-ish. Yeah."

"So are we going?"

Inlé shrugged and turned to leave. As he walked off, he answered, "Why not?"

He walked casually down the street, looking at nothing as he went, taking corners sharply, though never interfering with other pedestrian traffic. He turned into an alleyway, as a shortcut of sorts.

"Hey, pal," a voice called Inlé out of his thoughts. "Got any change you can spare a guy off his luck?" A man, dirty and downtrodden, looked up at Inlé with little hope that a boy would have anything for him. He'd called out out of habit, but was too tired to rise and move or even look away as Inlé stopped and paused to consider the man.

Reaching into his pocket, Inlé withdrew an envelope, a few folded bills, and an orange slip, which he placed into the man's surprised outstretched hand. Inlé said, "Deliver this to the Queen. There is some money and the instructions on how to reach her. Go quickly, and there may be more payment on her end."

The man looked down at the contents in his hand as he rose to his feet. His eyes grew large for a moment, then, to hide his surprise, he nodded briefly to Inlé before checking the note again and running off to follow the instructions.

Inlé made his own way deeper into the alley's shadows. One must, of course, be careful when one uses abilities or technologies well and beyond what is normal. As with the bracelets he always carried. Pulling a silver band from his wrist, Inlé stretched it into a doorway before him. Through this new passage was the bright, nearly cloudless sky as it would be seen from the roof of Inlé's apartment building, as that was exactly where the other end of this doorway lead. The only real problem with these doorways, in Inlé's opinion, was having to get used to stepping through one only to find that gravity has changed directions on the other end.

In this situation, for example, he had to climb out of the doorway before him. Stepping with one leg through the doorway before him, he hooked his knee onto the ground beside the hole his entrance left. He then grabbed either side of the gap and kicked through with his standing leg, vaulting out of the hole. He left his left hand grasping the side of the gap as he did so, and pulled the ring that was his bracelet out of the ring that was the entrance he had stepped through. The surfaces between the two warped as their entrances collided, faced one another, and then separated. Inlé held the large band with his fingertips now, careful to keep them outside of its center. He pressed it together slowly, shrinking both bands to bracelet size and shape, thought he held only the one. When the band was of appropriate size, the bands 'closed', becoming nothing more than independent rings. The one he left on the white ground of the flat roof appeared to be nothing more than a wrinkle in the material. Inlé returned the bracelet to his wrist and turned for the door that lead to the stairwell down to his apartment.

*****

Allow me here to introduce myself. Perhaps this way will better explain.

I am not your average high school student. Every student will say that and, in fact, speak truth in saying so. There is not a single 'everyday' person. No two persons are the same physically, mentally, or emotionally. Which, I suppose, makes them all ironically the same. But I am different to a degree far beyond what is considered an average shift from society's accepted 'norm'.

I'm no superhero. Not in the usual sense, at the least. I don't save people from burning buildings or stop bank robbers or fight incredibly powerful, yet eccentric and foolish, super-powered villains. I do nothing of the sort. I'm not an alien or some dead/undead/vampiric/lycanthropic/god/what-have-you.

No. I am a wanderer of worlds--the Worldwanderer, if you will. I once fell through the cracks of existence, saw the whole of existence and, when my journey was complete, returned ... changed. I know the laws of existence; in this universe and in all others. I could explain them to you, but there are no words to explain such things, and usually I remember only what is needed when it is needed, and little else.

I have seen things that are the stuff of legend, the stuff of dreams. The stuff of nightmares. Much that I have seen, I wish I could forget; most that I have learned, I wish no one had ever known. They are things too terrible to imagine, things that make the most horrifying thing of your deepest darkest fears, lusts, and rages seem simple, even mundane. But there are also things of inexplicable beauty. Things that make the heart weep for the joy of even seeing them, whether stationary or in motion, silent or in song. Things that make all your hopes come true. And some things just plain come in handy. Like the ability to teleport from one place to another. Or to use the laws of the sciences or change them as I see fit. Or the ability to bask in the chaos of magicks.

I keep these things secret from most people--from anyone who would not know without my telling. From anyone who could get hurt. Secrecy is paramount when you can do the impossible without so much as breaking a sweat. Especially when most of it is usable only when truly needed. It helps that I am not too strong. My knowledge is vast, but limited by necessity, and the resources at my disposal are pitiful few. If I trained ... But I can not do so openly. I can remember some little bits and pieces, though. Like how to make magical tools to help me use my abilities, many strong enough for even a mundane--an ungifted, untrained person--to use. I use them for storage and for transportation.

Damn, though. I do love the teleport. It makes things so much easier.

*****

Inlé came into the apartment's entryway. A few pairs of shoes and a pair of jackets were neatly stored there, but Inlé did not remove his own shoes as he entered.

"I'm back," he called. Back, not home. There is no home for a wanderer.

From the other room, his mother called, "Already? Did you forget the appointment?"

"No," he answered. He walked into the living room to face his mother. "I went."

"And?"

"It's official, mother. I'm crazy."

His mother said, "Inlé! I can't believe you'd say that! The doctor didn't say that, did he?"

"Would he?" Inlé asked. "No, mother, he would not. But on his notes, I spotted a bit saying 'extreme emotional imbalance generating delusional behaviors'. That's psycho-babble for crazy."

Inlé began to walk to his room as his mother called after him. "Inlé! You looked at his notes? Why would he allow such a thing?"

Inlé said, "He didn't. I spotted it as I was leaving. Face it, mother. I'm as mad as a porridge knife. Oh," he paused. "My next appointment is on the twenty-sixth at three. I'll be home late, as I have a date." He pushed his door open.

"A date, huh? And the girl is ... ?"

Inlé looked at his mother. "The attendant at the doctor's office. She asked me as she made my next appointment. I just went along with it."

"So it's just something to do? Nothing special?" His mother looked disappointed.

"No," Inlé agreed, "nothing special. Probably a one time thing. I have other things to do now, though. Goodnight." He stepped into his room and closed the door.

"What about dinner," his mother called.

"Not hungry," Inlé answered. "Not eating." Inlé leaned back against his door and looked over his room.

It was a small room, as would be expected in an apartment, with white walls and a white carpet. There was a small window against the wall opposite the door, where hung simple white drapes. Against one wall was a twin-sized bed, perfectly made, with white sheets. Beside him was a full-door dresser, bone white, as tall as he was. There was nothing to show that anyone lived in this room. There was no dust, though it was never cleaned. It was sterile, pristine, lifeless.

Inlé let his long hair down, sat cross-legged in the middle of the floor, and placed his hands palm-up in his lap. After a moment, his hair began to stir, swirling around his head in the windless room. The flurry controlling his hair lifted Inlé off of the ground, and his head began to glow. Inlé became translucent as the room around him wrinkled like wet paper. Then he became solid once more as his hair stretched and straightened behind him. The room became black, and swirled about him like water entering a drain, and vanished, leaving Inlé nowhere, with his hair a disk behind him, with all the colors of existence pouring through the gaps. His eyes tore open as his green eyes glared at something before him that none but he could see. Those eyes flickered orange for a moment, and a new world grew around him.

*****

I haven't slept in that bed in the four months I've lived here. When I sleep, which is rare now, I avoid lying down; it allows the blood to become more sluggish, slows the waking reflexes. Not that I dislike the rest brought on by sleep, though dreams rarely grant me peace. I'm simply too busy.

Most youth my age are working registers, flipping burgers, washing dishes, or stocking shelves. I sometimes wish my job was so tedious. Not that my job is really that bad. At least there's never a dull moment. There's little money involved, and no real benefits--as a normal person would see them. The hours are painful, often interfering with school, and I'm allowed no personal life as I am always on call. It's almost like being top-secret military or a superhero, but not as 'cool'.

I am a Worldwanderer. The Worldwanderer. I basically hold the title of existence's janitor. And existence always needs someone to take out the trash.

*****

Inlé looked expressionlessly over a cityscape of ruin. The world around him looked more a painting from the surrealist movement than any sane world. The city before him was large, with a plethora of skyscrapers. But many of them were broken, fractured bones jutting from the flesh of the surrounding city.

A rash of fires pocked the city, releasing acrid black smoke up into the purple and grass-green sky. Pinkish-white fog flowed through the city streets and sent large drops of acid rain racing toward the stars.

In the sky itself, an enormous gash had been torn open, and it bled over the city. Though the sun was high, the moon was draped over a nearby tree. The tree itself was enormous, leafless, and made of some sort of multi-colored crystal.

Bubbles of strange gasses floated about the city and the land around it. Anything they touched became warped and twisted. Stone burned, wood melted, fire froze. Cars sprouted flowers after being half-turned inside out. When the bubbles floated on, the things they touched would return to the forms they had had before being exposed. But not always.

As Inlé looked for whomever had requested his presence, he listened to the screams of people fleeing in terror from horrors that were--quite likely--very dangerous and--surprisingly as likely--very much as afraid of the chaos around them as those who fled.

He heard a footstep and turned, unsurprised to see a giant man with a large mouth standing behind him. The man stood over Inlé, looking down at him with cold, dead eyes.

Inlé turned and placed a fist over his heart. "Lord Masod," he said. "What service need you of me?"

Masod glared down at Inlé. "I know you see what this world looks like now. How can you ask 'what service' we need of you? We may indeed need you now, mortal. But that will not be for long."

Inlé said, "As you say, sir. Certainly I have never been to this world before. If my methods seem strange, pray account them to my foreign upbringing, and forgive me my ignorance."

Masod glared down at Inlé for a moment longer, then said, "You at least speak well. Come, follow me to my brethren."

With a wave of one talon-like hand, Masod disappeared in a puff of smoke.

Inlé stood for a few moments, unmoving, when Masod returned.

"Well?" Masod asked. "What is the matter now?"

Inlé punched his heart again. "Apologies, Lord, but I am unable to follow you in that manner. I have not the power."

"Then how did you get here?" Masod asked.

Inlé answered impassively, "By order, Lord. I was called, and I came. But I have not power enough to do so with utter frequency. It would destroy me."

Masod looked Inlé up and down with apparent disdain. "I am amazed that we even requested the aid of such a weakling as this. Very well, I will carry you. You will not enjoy this."

In a third puff of smoke, Masod transformed into a vulture larger than a bull. He flapped his wings to get aloft, grabbed Inlé up roughly with his vicious talons, and began to fly.

Their flight took them away from the city and into a more normal looking wilderness, though the sun seemed to stay just in the corner of Inlé's eye whichever way he looked, as if it moved with them. The sky stayed that strange color as well.

Minutes of flight over forest and desert brought the two to a mountain that climbed well above anything around it. To its summit Masod flew and, reaching that, into the amphitheater there.

After unceremoniously dropping Inlé onto the central dais, Masod transformed back to his black-robed form and took the leftmost of five thrones in front of where Inlé was standing.

All about him sat deities, Inlé knew, as he stood the spectacle on the platform. The five thrones before him were filled by three goddesses and two gods, one being Masod.

Inlé faced these five when he quietly addressed his audience. "Lords and Ladies, I greet you all. I am the Worldwanderer, and I have been called here for a reason. May I then ask, what service need you of me?"

Above the clamor of the host surrounding him, the god occupying the central throne answered Inlé, "As you can see, Wanderer, we are many. A host here to rule this world, and rule it we do. Each has been born into their duties and has been faithful to fulfill the expectations of their followers.

"But something has become of one among us that we cannot cope with ourselves. Much as I am pained to admit, we do not know how to control this catastrophe that has befallen us. So we call you."

Inlé punched his heart as he said, "Truly I am honored to serve you all. What is there to correct?"

"You see," said the goddess in the rightmost throne, "one of our ranks has died. Of itself, this is not unusual. Rensyd rules the flow of reincarnation that controls the cycle of life and death on this world. Because of this, he must regularly die himself and be reborn, that he experience this and understand better his subjects.

"But a few days ago, as he lay dying, a man approached him and somehow captured the soul of Rensyd at the moment of his death. That this ... method is used to prevent the reincarnation of an enemy or to preserve an ally that then may be returned to life instead of reincarnated was known to us. But we did not know that such a thing could work on one of we gods.

"Worse, the man consumed Rensyd's soul, taking on his powers, shirking his responsibilities, and, we fear, killing Rensyd ... forever."

The goddess beside her stirred then. "That we are capable of stopping this once-mortal, we are quite certain, understand. But he has some means of robbing us of our powers. With the powers of Rensyd added to him, we do not know what methods he may be capable of using to steal our powers."

The third goddess, seated between Masod and the central throne said, "What is more, as he does indeed possess the powers of Rensyd, merely to seal his soul away would not benefit us in any way. Mortals would still die, but none would be born. Eventually, all living things of this world would die."

Masod concluded the explanation, saying, "And killing him will do next to nothing, as he decides where and when he would be reborn. We would be forced to lie in wait for him as our world dies around us."

"So we come to you, Wanderer," the first god said. "Though it chagrins no few of our ranks that a mere mortal should save we gods from this danger, we--I--humbly beg your assistance in this."

The god rose, his splendrous robe shining like the sun, and approached the dais. He dropped to his knees before Inlé, saying, "Please, I beg you. Rensyd was--and is--my son. First of my children, and I love him still."

Inlé, impassive, looked down at the god at his feet. "Lord Namryd, please. It is not right for one such as yourself to beg. Please, stand. I am not worthy of this display."

Namryd rose, looking pleadingly at Inlé. He asked, "But you will help us?"

"As best I can, Lord," Inlé answered. "As best I can.

"May I assume he is in the city where I first arrived?"

"Yes," the first goddess answered. "Will you need anything from us for this confrontation?"

"I will. Be ready to grant me some small supports as I need them, please. I do not yet know what that need will be, nor if it truly will be needed. But if I am to need something, may I trust that you will supply me so long as it does not endanger you in the process?"

It was Masod who answered then, "And how will you send your requests? Or discern what will and will not endanger us?"

"Surely, Lord Masod," Inlé said, "you receive your prayers through the same channels as before, do you not?"

Masod stood angrily. "You insult me, mortal?"

Inlé punched his heart. "Not at all, Lord. I merely answer your question. If, Lords and Ladies, I need anything from any of you, you will find yourself in my prayers, so to speak."

A voice from the crowd called, "And how will you know who it is you need?"

Inlé turned to face the speaker, far from the center of the amphitheater. He answered, "I will know, Lord Phask, when I need to. But I will not know any sooner. That is the best I can explain.

"It is also," Inlé continued, turning back to face the thrones, "the way I will know whether my request would endanger you, Lord Masod."

Inlé shifted, his stance. "Now, if I may, I would like to get this first portion finished quickly. Lords and Ladies, I beg your pardon as I take my leave. I will return when I have recovered Lord Rensyd--in whatever form he may now be--or discern it an impossibility.

"I pray to see you all soon."

Inlé dropped down through the dais, disappearing from the amphitheater.

Masod growled. "I thought he said he couldn't jump place to place."

"Patience, Masod," Namryd said. "He spoke truly."

The god pointed to a shoulder-wide ring in the dais where the mortal had vanished. "It seems our mortal has some tools to at least make his job less difficult."

"Humph," Masod said. "The boy's still smug."

Inlé dropped up into the air above where he had first arrived. He nimbly righted himself in the air to land above the ring he had fallen through. He grabbed the ring up and shrunk it back to the size of a bracelet, which he returned to his wrist.

Inlé headed down to the city, emotionlessly cool. As he approached, he began to pray, "Lady Thyacin, find for me what I seek. Grant me the favor of the hunt. Lord Namryd, see for me when I cannot see myself. Grant me the favor of the sun. Lady Lanie, grace me with flight, for I may need it. Grant me the favor of the wind."

He leapt into the air then, and hung. For a moment, Inlé moved lightly, learning how he could move in his flight. Then he continued into the chaos before him.

Floating above the screaming people as they ran past--chased, no doubt, by their own demons--Inlé looked for the menace causing the chaos. He was untouched by the plight of those around him, feeling not even pity as he saw a man torn apart directly in his path.

Higher Inlé flew, into the pink clouds and the rain above them, searching. Higher still, until he was in the impenetrable darkness of the riling smoke. For a moment, he could not see. Then his vision changed to some other spectrum, and the smoke no longer bothered his eyes.

There. By the tear in the sky, Inlé saw someone floating and drinking its blood as it poured out. Inlé knew the man and called to him.

"Larjam," Inlé said, as he approached the once-man. "Or should I say Lord Larjam? You do consider yourself a god, I suppose."

Larjam turned his blood-smeared face toward Inlé. Wild golden eyes stared coldly at emotionless green ones. "I am he. Who are you?"

"No one of importance," Inlé answered. "May I ask how it is you now have such power?"

"It is mine!" Larjam cried, cackling wildly and frothing the blood around his mouth. "It is mine, and none of you can stop me! Come at me in ones and twos, and I will take you all in ones and twos!"

He lunged at Inlé, who sidestepped the attack with little effort. Larjam received a kick to the ribs for his trouble.

"I have no desire to fight you, sir," Inlé said. "All I wish to do is talk."

"That's what you all want, isn't it? To talk. Talk, talk, talk." Larjam flapped his hands at each other madly. Purely, simply mad.

His eyes became clear--insanely sane--as he looked back at Inlé. "But that isn't what you want at all, is it? You want my power. That's what this is about, isn't it? This power I have that I took.

"I. I took. Not you. Not anyone else. It's mine, and you can't have it. No one else can. This world will die with me, and I will take everything with me. As I took those who came before you."

Inlé moved just out of reach of the next lunge, this one much closer than the last. "Others came before me? How many?"

"How many, how many," Larjam mimicked. "You know well, you do. You don't fool me. No! not fool me at all. I know."

"Know me, Larjam? Not likely. This is my first time in this world. You, of all, should be able to tell this. Have I ever been in your domain? You would feel the connection, would you not? You can feel the rest of this world. Can you feel me, Larjam?"

Confusion washed over the mad godling's face. "No ... From outside? There is no outside. No outside. Who ... what are you?" He lunged at Inlé with renewed fervor. "No outside! None! No gods! Silly girl, there are no gods! If there were, why are they not seen?"

Larjam no longer saw what was around him. Trapped in his own mind, in his own hell, all he could do was attack this newest offense to his sensibilities. He swung wildly, but Inlé evaded the attacks with increasing difficulty as they became more focused. And faster.

"No outside! There can't be! Impossible! You'll believe anything, won't you? Are you stupid? Do you take me for such a fool?" His hand caught Inlé's sleeve, and held it. His face curled into a snarl. "You're mine! How can you go to someone else? No! I'll prove to you I'm right! Then you must love me. Look only at me!"

Inlé's sleeve was torn off at the shoulder as he was pulled toward the demented Larjam. Inlé saved himself by leaping off Larjam's growing chest.

And grow it did. Larjam tripled in size in a matter of moments, crackling with divine energy, cackling with human madness. "You will die, outsider! I will destroy you and your outside! As I destroyed the five who came to take my powers before you! Come at me in numbers, come at me alone. I will destroy you utterly."

He rushed forward again, and this time Inlé was too slow to get out of the way. Down the two plummeted, crashing into the city streets below. From the crater rose the mad Larjam, cackling madly. "Fool! This is the fate of those who oppose me!"

The calm voice from above surprised him. "What fate is that, Larjam? Please, celebrate my death when my death is confirmed, not before." Inlé slowly lowered to stand a short distance from Larjam, adjusting the bracelet on his wrist.

"Impossible," Larjam gasped. "I had you. Had you. No one can live from a fall that height."

"Then I did not fall," Inlé answered. "Larjam, listen to reason. I wish only to speak with you. Where, pray, is the danger in that? What did I say to convince you I was an enemy? Perhaps I am an ally. Think reasonably."

Larjam calmed, but the madness was chaos in his eyes. They flickered through the spectrum as they looked at things, eyes opposing the colors they saw. "Ally. Yes. That would be good. There is so much to do. So much. Help is good."

"Good. Yes, it is. But if I am going to help you, you must let me be like you. Is that fair?"

"Fair. Like me. Yes. How, like me? Like me how?" Larjam's faculties had not entirely abandoned him. He was still shrewd, Inlé saw. Inlé was suddenly glad that his enemy was mad. The madness would aide him.

"You want to destroy these ... gods."

"There are no gods!" Larjam bellowed.

"Yes. There are no gods. But ... I can not kill them. I do not know how. How did you kill them. If I were your ally, would you not tell me?"

"Are you my ally?"

Inlé paused, wondering if a direct lie that his foe was already inclined to disbelieve would be too apparent. Or whether one of the gods killed would be able to discern lies. But there were always backdoors. "Would you like me to be?"

Larjam stared quizzically at Inlé for a long moment. "What are you called?"

Inlé replied automatically. This was an answer he had. "I am called many things. I am often called the Worldwanderer. I am sometimes called useful, always called reliable, and occasionally called friend. But titles matter little, what might you call me?" No lies. Honest, but vague. Give nothing away.

Larjam laughed. "Very well, wanderer--Wanderer! I like that. Very well, I will tell you how I stole the power of my first god."

Inlé listened as Larjam told his story. He--Larjam--had studied the scriptures pertaining to the god Rensyd. It was in them that he learned that once every few generations, this god died on a mountainside, so he could know the flow of mortality. It was in them that he found the pattern that allowed him to determine where that mountainside was, and that the next death would come in his lifetime.

And he waited. Waited a year, telling those who listened that he would disprove the gods. Waited until he left for the mountain alone, to face the nothingness that was said to be a god. And there he waited for anything to happen.

But he was far from overjoyed to meet a fellow traveller on the mountainside. A tall man, young looking, but with eyes that were too old. The two talked for a time, watching the sunset. And as the sun set, the man beside Larjam laid down and died. Larjam did not know what to believe at the moment, so he believed that the man was only a figment of his imagination.

He disbelieved and disbelieved until he believed the man to be a part of himself. But as Larjam rose, he again touched the dead man. And believed the man was truly himself, and not another person. And the man ceased to be.

It was only days afterwards that a second man appeared, telling Larjam to return the god Rensyd. Larjam argued that there was no god Rensyd, having forced disbelief into a partial amnesia.

The man revealed himself a god, though, and forced Larjam to remember his night on the mountainside. Larjam was driven mad by this revelation. And his madness and his stolen divinity gave him the power to kill the man before him.

But his shattered mind could not believe he was capable of such murder--not yet, at any rate--and his disbelief pulled the other god into himself, granting this once-mortal more power. And more madness.

"See, Wanderer? I am as I always was! Only the world around me has weakened! I am the same today as I was yesterday, and life is no different from birth to death and beyond."

"I thought you said there was nothing after death."

Larjam howled. "There is nothing after death! Nothing!"

"Then how is that the same as life?" Inlé asked.

"Life is nothing also! Everything is nothing, and all of it is not!"

Inlé stood calmly watching this insane man-god. He stood silent for a long time, as opposite him the frayed edges of a beleaguered psyche seeped from the cracks of their host and burst like sparklers all about.

He shifted as he said, "So. Disbelief is enough to draw the power of your enemy into yourself. This you believe and understand to the degree that it has become truth. I am sorry."

Inlé began to walk slowly toward Larjam. "Truly, I am sorry. You have done nothing wrong in all of this. In the least, not deliberately. You followed protocols never before acknowledged, but nonetheless existent in this realm. After the theft of power, though ...

"There you made a mistake, Larjam." Inlé shook his head. "Had you adhered to your newfound responsibilities, you would be blameless. But you chose instead to deny even your responsibilities. Laws are laws. Here you must be punished."

Larjam's eyes bulged when he found himself unable to move as the strange boy before him advanced. Retreat was impossible, and he could feel it. Knew it to be true. "What have you done to me, Wanderer? What have you done?"

Inlé shook his head, his stony visage eternally emotionless. "You do not understand, do you, Larjam? I have no intention of aiding you. I was brought here for the purpose of removing you from the equation. I am here to erase you."

Larjam's rage was complete. Breaking free of whatever hold Inlé had had on him, the man-god attacked wildly. Inlé did his best to react before he was torn asunder, but his adversary's potential was rapidly developing.

Inlé was grabbed and flung by the ankle, tearing silver shoe and soft flesh. He hurtled through the air, muttering quiet prayers to every god in turn.

Larjam charged wildly, slashing, grabbing, lunging at Inlé. Occasionally, his rage would bleed off of him in a concentration of hatred so strong as to become a living thing striking independently at Inlé. Buffeted and battered, Inlé weathered the storm manifest by his foe's fury. The storm circled the two, tearing at Inlé's body, forcing him into positions allowing easy attacks for Larjam.

Then, subtle as the first frost, sudden as the first snap, Inlé was released from his storm-wrought bonds. He was able to move freely again, and gained control of himself. Larjam's final blow did not land as so many had before. Instead, Inlé captured it between his hands.

A trickle of blood spilled from his mouth as Inlé said, "My last prayer be to Lord Masod. Grant me the power to appraise this soul before me. Bless me with the favor of the court, over which you yourself do preside. And may my judgement be upheld upon this world, even unto its foundations."

Inlé closed his eyes. "Larjam, Usurper and Lord of many facets, I do thus find you guilty of theft of power not meant for such as yourself, of invalid use of such power as was achieved, and of damaging the surrounding world in blatant disregard to the warp and weft of said world with said power. The punishment for this crime is death, that the possibility of a return to equilibrium may be realized.

"I am sorry, but you are now dead."

And with that, Larjam died. The souls bound within the fragile human body tore out at their release, flaying their former host as they did so. His remains crumpled to the ground, a puddle of refuse no longer human. Without so much as a glance at the remains, Inlé turned and began to repair the damage about him.

He climbed first to the tear in the sky. Putting his hands upon it, he said, "This wound will not do you justice, Lord Sky. I thus take it upon myself, that your recovery would be accelerated." The festering, bleeding wound closed quickly, a bloodshot eye, closing to rest.

Inlé grunted in pain as the flesh across his chest audibly tore in time with the closing of the sky's injury. A red patch grew on his jacket front.

"Now," Inlé said, "where to begin? I have much to do, repairing this damaged world."

"So you have disposed of the renegade?"

"I have, Lord Masod," Inlé answered, once more on the dais among the gods. He stood at attention, emotionlessly prepared for the questions that would be sent his way before he could return home.

The first goddess spoke, "And what of those absorbed? Is their fate, then, lost? Are we all to fall away, now?"

"Lady Bremudaia, the souls removed are stored here." Inlé held up a hand containing ten silver coins. Each coin was of slightly different size and shape, and each held a different face, one being Larjam's.

"Impressive," Namryd said. "I am surprised you knew how to do that, Wanderer."

"Truly, I did not, Lord," Inlé answered, "until the need arose. Now, try a thousand times, I would be unable to repeat the feat. This power I have is fleeting."

"Still," the goddess beside Masod said, "that you were able to do so once to so many souls at once is a feat above any a mortal has hence done in this realm."

"Save one, good Lady Thyacin," Inlé answered. "Save one."

"And what, pray," Masod sneered, "was that? Your repairs to our world? That is also a powerful feat."

"Three laws broken, one bent, and seventy-three manipulations of powers, Lord."

A voice in the crowd called out, "A pity you don't charge by the challenge!" A murmur went up around the court.

Inlé turned and punched his heart, saying, "Lord Danym, were I to charge in such a way, there would be few even among your varied peers able to aptly compensate. But I truly would have little use for what I would be paid for such services."

Masod grunted. "Whether or not that were true, you have not told us what you believe is a more impressive feat, boy. Well?"

Inlé returned to facing the five thrones. "Lord, truly, this should be of no surprise, but I find the abilities of the late Lord Larjam surpass all feats aforementioned outright."

The dismay from the gods filling the amphitheater shook the mountain it sat upon to its roots. The pressure of this display of power nearly crushed Inlé's body, though the only evidence of his being affected were his wounds spurting a small amount of blood before he stopped it with a wave of his hand over his heart.

"Am I then to believe, Wanderer," Namryd began, "that you ... admired this man? That you held some sort of respect for him?"

"Admiration, Lord, none. A lawbreaker is a lawbreaker, and I have no tolerance for such activity ..."

"I see," Namryd said, sounding relieved.

"... But," Inlé continued, "I do indeed respect him in that he was able to find a loophole in governance of this universe and exploit it. His methods were, initially, wholly lawful. Unfortunately, his madness drove him to outright shatter some of the laws.

"And his ability to manipulate powers newly discovered within himself to such a degree as to break things to the degree that they were broken surpasses my meager, though honed, skills being used to repair them. It was much easier to repair them than to break them."

Masod leapt from his seat. "You envy the bastard!"

"I do not," Inlé replied.

Masod prowled around the central dais. "You want his power for yourself!"

"I do not," Inlé replied.

"And did you learn how he acquired his powers?" Masod asked, in a suddenly oily voice.

"I certainly did, Lord," Inlé replied.

"So you could use it against us?"

"I could not, Lord."

"And what is it that would prevent you, Wanderer?" asked the goddess beside Bremudaia.

Inlé punched his heart as he answered, "Even had I not closed that loophole when I discovered it, I am not capable, Lady Lanie, of doubting your existence. I do not know of any who could so strongly disbelieve as that man has done."

"Masod, sit," Namryd ordered. Masod obeyed. "So, Wanderer, how are we to retrieve our brethren from your coins?"

"Lord, you need only call to them as I hold up the coin. I believe they will manifest of their own will upon your summons."

"It is almost too simple," Bremudaia said. "Wanderer, may I see one of the coins before we call them? I wish to see how you so cleanly sealed them."

"Certainly, Lady. Have you a preference as to whom you would like?" Inlé opened his palm.

"Just throw me any of them--except for Larjam" She shuddered slightly as she said the name. A coin was thrown.

"And speaking of him," Thyacin said, "What is to be done with him? Must he be freed?"

"Lady, he need not be released," Inlé answered. "But, had I the choice--which I do not, having not the power to do so--I would return him to the cycle of lives. Merely releasing him under different circumstances could bring him to cause great good, even as he has done great harm.

"Imagine, if you would, his unbelief which gave him the power to steal your own turned to belief. His conviction--his certitude--could greatly benefit your causes were he a follower. Releasing him into a place where he would be raised devout may be beneficial. And, were it possible, I would return him to a place away from the woman he follows so doggedly. If only as a kindness."

"Perhaps we shall," Namryd mused. "But let us begin with the others for now."

The calling took only a short while for each coin to dissolve as its relative god emerged unscathed. Eight callings went perfectly. Then the last god was to be called.

"At last," said Namryd. "My son returned to me. Rensyd, come."

The coin shook and glowed. A voice called, "No."

Another commotion arose with the gods' shock.

"What?" Namryd cried. "You defy me?"

"Father, I do," The voice said. "Please, let me die. Let me die and forget. I do not wish to go through this painful cycle again."

Namryd's face looked as if it would break. "Son, why? Why must you do this?"

The coin shook, "You do not understand, father. Death is painful, even dying peacefully. And birth ... Babies do not cry without reason."

Namryd said, "Is there no way I can convince you to stay?"

Rensyd replied, "None, father. I can no longer stand this as I am. I am not so strong as you need me."

Inlé cleared his throat. "If I may be so bold, Lord Rensyd, would a companion aid in your ability to tolerate this?"

The coin hummed in Inlé's palm. "... A companion?"

"If, say, there was another god who grew with you, lived with you, perhaps even died with you. Perhaps they would share your discomforts, but perhaps that would lessen the sting from both of your pains."

Namryd said, "Do you mean yourself, Wanderer?"

"Alas, no. While such a prospect is to some desirable, I am not able to fill such a position. I am not for such things."

"But to create a god, boy," Masod said, "that is a thing quite difficult. And even were one of us to bear a child, even from Rensyd's own seed, there would be little hope he would share that position."

"Then, Lord, we merely split the original. A suggestion: using a host soul, we channel a small portion of Rensyd into this other soul. We then allow the portion to consume the other soul and grow into a near exact replica of the original. The soul consumed would not be destroyed, but remolded into something more.

"This of course would be dangerous, as using a weak soul may cause Rensyd to lose his expended power by destroying the soul utterly. Also, if the portion is not properly removed, Rensyd will not regenerate it.

"But, Lords and Ladies, we even have a soul capable of fostering this seeding process available."

"Wanderer, you don't mean to suggest ..." the goddess choked on the name.

"Yes, Lady Lanie, I do," Inlé said. "Larjam has already shown the capacity for his soul to contain a deity's power. If properly administered, he may not be such a ... problematic participant.

"Would this suffice, Lord Rensyd?"

"Would you be able to do this, Wanderer? Could you transfer the power?"

Inlé paused. His emotionless face was unreadable, but it was understood that he was calculating the odds of success. The gods grew silent.

After a long, restless wait, Inlé answered, "I could, perhaps." Then, so quietly that only Rensyd in his hand could hear, "There is an eighty per cent chance the power would be transferrable. Within that is a thirty-five per cent chance that power will be regenerated within you, and a separate fifty-eight per cent chance that the power will become manifest in the new soul. This means that the optimal outcome has just less than a thirteen per cent chance for success."

Rensyd asked quietly, "How much less?"

"Eight thousandths of one per cent. Meaning the odds are twelve point nine-nine-two per cent in your favor."

"Not exceptional odds to stake my soul on."

"No, Lord."

"Well, it can't be worse than dying, I suppose."

"That, Lord, I would not know."

"Be thankful for that," Rensyd said. Then he said more loudly, "Very well, I will try it. Father, would you call us out?"

The last two coins dissolved, and Rensyd and Larjam emerged, Larjam unconscious.

"It was my belief," Inlé explained, "that were you to return this man to the cycle, you would want an easy way to kill him before he could resist."

"Drat!" Bremudaia said. "I should have looked at his coin too, after all."

"Lady, I am sure you will quickly find the method used to do this."

"Doubtless," Namryd agreed. "Now, Inlé, please begin the process."

"I will, Lord," Inlé answered, punching his heart.

Inlé returned to his room shearing through the boundary between this reality and the other, two feet above the ground, legs and arms crossed. His hair, now the pastel colors of the sunset, hung straight down, untied, and blood trickled lightly from his scalp.

Blood and the various colors of sunset and aurora were visibly splattered over his tattered hoodie, which had lost half the left sleeve and the entire right one, revealing the black tee shirt beneath.

His left pant leg was torn up the inseam and again down from the center of the back pocket, causing a strip to dangle nearly to the ground. His right shoe was missing, and that foot oozed dark, half-dried blood.

Landing lightly, he inspected himself. After removing his clothes, he stood naked over the pile of ruined clothing with a dozen small silver bracelets hanging around his left wrist.

The gash across his chest stretched from his left collarbone to the bottom rib on the right, deep and slowly oozing. Numerous smaller nicks and scratches covered his arms and torso, and his ankle's wound was deep. He was somewhat bruised as well, and his eyes were sunken with fatigue.

He dabbed his ruined shirt against his wounds, then pulled a small knife and a needle from the sleeve of his hoodie. With the knife, he removed a single, long thread from the seam of the hoodie. He then began to sew his large wound closed.

From the door, Inlé's mother called in, "Inlé! I just heard a crashing noise just now. Is something the matter?"

"No, mother," Inlé responded, "I"--He inhaled sharply as he pulled the needle through--"am fine. I just knocked something out of the dresser." He hissed again, then called, "Hey, what is this anyway? Did you put a little statue in my closet?"

From behind the locked door, his mother called, "What? Let me see what you're talking about!"

Inlé finished closing his wound and replied, "Hold on, I was changing. Just let me finish first. And comb my hair. I will be out in ten minutes with it. Okay?"

"Okay," his mother replied calmly.

Inlé quickly closed the hole in his ankle, rose, and opened his bureau. Inside were a dozen sets of clothing identical to those on the floor behind him, save clean. A shelf above them stored an equal number of identical pairs of Inlé's silver shoes. Removing two sets of clothing and one pair of shoes, he hung one set on the door, and donned the other with the shoes. Within the bureau, a dozen sets of clothing hung beneath an equal number of shoes.

Reaching into his sleeve, Inlé pulled out a comb and brushed the sunset colors out of his hair and onto the pile of ruined clothes. Finishing, he returned the comb to his sleeve and threw the second set of removed clothing over the mess.

He stared at the pile for a moment, then muttered to himself as he knelt, "Now for the cover-up."

He began tracing a circle on the ground, by dragging some of the liquid aurora with his finger. "Simple, yet pretty." He traced a square circumscribed within the circle. "Marble, perhaps?" He circumscribed a diamond within the circle, None of the eight points touched. "A unicorn." He traced a symbol into each point, starting from the top and writing counter-clockwise: α, σ, τ, α, τ, υ, ε, ◦.

Leaning back, he looked down at the hasty circle. "That should work. Here goes ..."

Inlé knelt over the circle and whispered, "Tsaf ti deen I .Seye erihppas eslaf htiw elbram etihw .Nrocinu a fo eutats a em dnes ,Ydal ,esaelp"

The circle glowed, flashing the colors of the fluid used to trace it. Slowly the circle warped and melted into nothingness as a small statue took form.

The statue was a life-like rendition of a unicorn, apparently carved from white marble, and with blue sapphire eyes. It stood lightly, as if frozen while grazing. It was beautiful. But the aurora-fluid had left its smear on the beast, streaking the white surface with pastel reds and greens and blues. These streaks, though, made it more beautiful still.

Picking the statue up, Inlé muttered, "It is a sloppy job at best, but I did rush it. Ah well."

He went to the door, and opened it to find his mother standing in front of it. Inlé lifts the statue and asked, "Is this your way of giving me a secret present or something?"

Staring at the statue, his mother responded, "No. I've never seen anything so pretty before. It really is lovely."

Inlé agreed, "It is that. Well, maybe it was something meant for you that I forgot about. It is yours."

His mother looked up at him happily as she took the statue. "Thank you, it's very pretty. I'm glad you remembered I like ..."

Her face suddenly darkened as she looked at his face, "Inlé! I can't believe you! Oh, I ought to just box your ears for this! You didn't even go to the psychiatrist's did you? You were off fighting or stealing, weren't you? Is this stolen?"

Inlé replied expressionlessly, "What? What do you mean? You do not believe me?"

"Believe you?" his mother cried. "You're bleeding out of the forehead and God knows where else, and you wonder why I don't believe you? I'm just surprised I didn't see a gash that big when you came in!"

"Gash?" Inlé echoed. "Bleeding?" Sure enough, having forgotten to patch the wound on his forehead, Inlé had left it to bleed again.

His mother was furious. "Don't play dumb with me, you. You couldn't have not noticed that."

"Had I known I was bleeding, mother, I would not have come to the door," Inlé said. "You would flip ou ..." Then an idea came to him. "Ah! That must be from when the statue fell out."

Skeptic, his mother said, "I don't buy it. You'd have said something before if that were the case."

"No," Inlé said, "I did not think about it. The statue hit me in the head with one of its hooves and must have clipped me better than I gave it credit for. You had best be careful not to drop it on your foot or something. It would hurt a lot."

Wanting to believe, wanting to think her son wasn't a delinquent, Inlé's mother conceded. "Well, I guess that could be what happened. I'll trust you for now. But if I find out you're lying to me ..." The sentence dragged off, leaving the implied threat unsaid.

"You won't," Inlé assured her.

A quizzical eyebrow lifted and a brief smirk preceded her saying, "Oh? So you've tricked me that good, eh?"

"No," Inlé said. "I mean that I really did go to the shrink and all that."

His mother began to walk back toward the living room. She called over her shoulder, "All right, you win. I'm going to find a place to put this. You can go back to your homework."

"I don't ..." Inlé began.

"And don't you dare tell me you don't have any. I know you do."

Inlé closed the door behind himself muttering, "Five minutes go by here, fifty hours go by there. Fifty more straight hours without rest." He dropped down between a corner and his dresser, propping his his heels up against the dresser and his back against the wall. "I don't need homework, I need some sleep."

And sleep he did.

Description
"That was five years ago," Inlé said as he laid back in a red leather long chair in the Psychiatrist's office. Inlé was there retelling the story to this new doctor, knowing full well that he, like every other psychiatrist Inlé had ever visited would think it only a dream, would write it off as some subconscious need being brought to the fore. Let them think so, was his thought.

The doctor sat in his armchair beside the single arm of Inlé's own seat, himself just above Inlé's head. "Very interesting, Inlé. I've never heard of a dream quite like it. Now, you say you first had it five years ago, when you were eleven?"

"Twelve, but just barely. And I have had it every once in a while ever since." That much was true. Inlé remembered it in dream almost regularly. Almost, but never when it was really expected.

Looking back at himself, Inlé was surprised at how much he had changed in just five years. He remembered back to when he regularly wore a pair of blue jeans and a sports shirt, complemented by a shaved head to made showers faster. Even then he'd hated water.

Collecting a mental image of himself now, his hair had become almost as long as his arm. Almost as long as that of the man in his dream. He kept it tied up in a topknot, letting it hang so long as it stayed out of his face. His attire was also different: Black knee-shorts and a black tee-shirt, neither with any markings on them, with an orange hooded sweatshirt over the tee, tattooed with various sigils and designs. Inlé knew all too well that he was not who he once had been.

"Yes, and does any of this dream ever change?" The doctor asked, looking down at Inlé with one eye through those small, round, fish-eye lens that so many in his profession seem to have.

"No," Inlé replied. It never did.

The doctor put the pad onto his lap, as though he were being more attentive. Or wanted Inlé to think so. "And do you ever act on this dream or on any others you may have?"

"Would I be here if I did not?"

"No," he sighed, "I suppose not." He shifted again, "So then, the question is rather how have you acted on these dreams?"

Inlé's arm being across his eyes, he couldn't see what the doctor was doing, but knew he was preparing to jot down whatever Inlé was about to say. He was audio-recording this, their first session, but still he jotted notes. At least he was interested in actually helping, Inlé considered, even if he thought Inlé was just a crazy kid.

"Well," Inlé began, "I guess it all started around a week after I first had the dream. I disappeared for about three days and had everyone worried. I had no recollection of disappearing, just of going to the bathroom. It all went downhill from there.

"For a few months, I would disappear every time I did something alone. Sometimes I would be gone for minutes, sometimes for days. On a few occasions, I wound up in different places. You know, when weird stuff happens to you like that, people start to shun you.

"Even old friends."

"Well, that's a very interesting story," the psychiatrist said, after a pause. "But dreams are dreams. How could they cross over into reality?"

"Well," Inlé tried, "what about memories being repeated?"

He paused, "So this actually happened to you, do you believe?"

"No," Inlé answered, "that would be crazy. You know, like not existing when others are not around. I was just pointing out when dreams and reality cross paths."

"But that's just reminiscing, not dreaming." Though the doctor rarely meant to sound condescending, (as now he only meant to kindly correct,) his voice had an aggravatingly strong tone to it that made him sound as though he were perpetually looking down on whomever he spoke with.

Inlé asked, "Even when asleep?"

"Even then," He reaffirmed.

Inlé sat up, turning to look at his psychiatrist. It was then that Inlé realized how young he was. Appearing to be in his mid-to-late thirties, the doctor's hair wasn't yet graying, though the stress of this job was already wearing on him. His face was lined with worries one outside the profession couldn't begin to imagine, many of them not originally his own. His brown hair was balding, or rather had already become bald from brow to the back of the head, leaving a wide band around the sides, but nothing on top. It fit him, making him seem more like Freud than if he'd grown a large beard in place of the delicate horn goatee he sported. The similarity between he and Freud stopped there, though. He did not smell at all of cigar smoke, and did not look as though he'd ever prescribed himself cocaine.

"Well doctor," Inlé began, rising to his feet, "thank you for your time. I know I can be a bore with my stories."

"Oh, no," he said. "That was more interesting than most of my appointments for today promise to be. You can schedule your next one in the lobby with Tanya."

Inlé tried, though he knew the answer, "Will I need another appointment?"

The doctor sounded more surprised at the idea than Inlé expected. "Won't you?"

Inlé shrugged and headed for the door. "Yeah, you are right. If I do not schedule myself, my mother or the police will, correct?"

He answered, "Only until things are sorted out. You need to be patient. You've caused a lot of trouble lately, Inlé. It only makes sense that they would seek to intervene."

Inlé pulled the office door closed behind himself. "Yeah ... I know."

Tanya at reception looked, in Inlé's opinion, like an average ditz. The cliché secretary: a busty blonde with blue eyes, she at least made a nice little eye-catch for anyone coming in. She looked young, but Inlé didn't care enough about most people to look closely unless absolutely necessary.

She chattered for a short while before Inlé started listening.

"... so the twenty-sixth is good?"

"Yeah," Inlé said.

She typed something into the computer before her. "Around three p.m.-ish?"

"Yeah," Inlé said.

She looked up at Inlé. "Wow, you're easy."

Unable to tell if it was a compliment, an insult or a question, Inlé paused just a moment before deciding to safely answer, "Yeah."

Tanya leaned over the desk toward him. "Are you available around six-ish that night?"

"Yeah," Inlé said.

She smiled. "You wanna go see a movie? I get out at ..."

"Yeah," he cut her off.

She pouted. "Are you even listening?"

"Yeah," Inlé said. "Twenty-sixth, three p.m. Movie at six-ish. Yeah."

"So are we going?"

Inlé shrugged and turned to leave. As he walked off, he answered, "Why not?"

He walked casually down the street, looking at nothing as he went, taking corners sharply, though never interfering with other pedestrian traffic. He turned into an alleyway, as a shortcut of sorts.

"Hey, pal," a voice called Inlé out of his thoughts. "Got any change you can spare a guy off his luck?" A man, dirty and downtrodden, looked up at Inlé with little hope that a boy would have anything for him. He'd called out out of habit, but was too tired to rise and move or even look away as Inlé stopped and paused to consider the man.

Reaching into his pocket, Inlé withdrew an envelope, a few folded bills, and an orange slip, which he placed into the man's surprised outstretched hand. Inlé said, "Deliver this to the Queen. There is some money and the instructions on how to reach her. Go quickly, and there may be more payment on her end."

The man looked down at the contents in his hand as he rose to his feet. His eyes grew large for a moment, then, to hide his surprise, he nodded briefly to Inlé before checking the note again and running off to follow the instructions.

Inlé made his own way deeper into the alley's shadows. One must, of course, be careful when one uses abilities or technologies well and beyond what is normal. As with the bracelets he always carried. Pulling a silver band from his wrist, Inlé stretched it into a doorway before him. Through this new passage was the bright, nearly cloudless sky as it would be seen from the roof of Inlé's apartment building, as that was exactly where the other end of this doorway lead. The only real problem with these doorways, in Inlé's opinion, was having to get used to stepping through one only to find that gravity has changed directions on the other end.

In this situation, for example, he had to climb out of the doorway before him. Stepping with one leg through the doorway before him, he hooked his knee onto the ground beside the hole his entrance left. He then grabbed either side of the gap and kicked through with his standing leg, vaulting out of the hole. He left his left hand grasping the side of the gap as he did so, and pulled the ring that was his bracelet out of the ring that was the entrance he had stepped through. The surfaces between the two warped as their entrances collided, faced one another, and then separated. Inlé held the large band with his fingertips now, careful to keep them outside of its center. He pressed it together slowly, shrinking both bands to bracelet size and shape, thought he held only the one. When the band was of appropriate size, the bands 'closed', becoming nothing more than independent rings. The one he left on the white ground of the flat roof appeared to be nothing more than a wrinkle in the material. Inlé returned the bracelet to his wrist and turned for the door that lead to the stairwell down to his apartment.

*****

Allow me here to introduce myself. Perhaps this way will better explain.

I am not your average high school student. Every student will say that and, in fact, speak truth in saying so. There is not a single 'everyday' person. No two persons are the same physically, mentally, or emotionally. Which, I suppose, makes them all ironically the same. But I am different to a degree far beyond what is considered an average shift from society's accepted 'norm'.

I'm no superhero. Not in the usual sense, at the least. I don't save people from burning buildings or stop bank robbers or fight incredibly powerful, yet eccentric and foolish, super-powered villains. I do nothing of the sort. I'm not an alien or some dead/undead/vampiric/lycanthropic/god/what-have-you.

No. I am a wanderer of worlds--the Worldwanderer, if you will. I once fell through the cracks of existence, saw the whole of existence and, when my journey was complete, returned ... changed. I know the laws of existence; in this universe and in all others. I could explain them to you, but there are no words to explain such things, and usually I remember only what is needed when it is needed, and little else.

I have seen things that are the stuff of legend, the stuff of dreams. The stuff of nightmares. Much that I have seen, I wish I could forget; most that I have learned, I wish no one had ever known. They are things too terrible to imagine, things that make the most horrifying thing of your deepest darkest fears, lusts, and rages seem simple, even mundane. But there are also things of inexplicable beauty. Things that make the heart weep for the joy of even seeing them, whether stationary or in motion, silent or in song. Things that make all your hopes come true. And some things just plain come in handy. Like the ability to teleport from one place to another. Or to use the laws of the sciences or change them as I see fit. Or the ability to bask in the chaos of magicks.

I keep these things secret from most people--from anyone who would not know without my telling. From anyone who could get hurt. Secrecy is paramount when you can do the impossible without so much as breaking a sweat. Especially when most of it is usable only when truly needed. It helps that I am not too strong. My knowledge is vast, but limited by necessity, and the resources at my disposal are pitiful few. If I trained ... But I can not do so openly. I can remember some little bits and pieces, though. Like how to make magical tools to help me use my abilities, many strong enough for even a mundane--an ungifted, untrained person--to use. I use them for storage and for transportation.

Damn, though. I do love the teleport. It makes things so much easier.

*****

Inlé came into the apartment's entryway. A few pairs of shoes and a pair of jackets were neatly stored there, but Inlé did not remove his own shoes as he entered.

"I'm back," he called. Back, not home. There is no home for a wanderer.

From the other room, his mother called, "Already? Did you forget the appointment?"

"No," he answered. He walked into the living room to face his mother. "I went."

"And?"

"It's official, mother. I'm crazy."

His mother said, "Inlé! I can't believe you'd say that! The doctor didn't say that, did he?"

"Would he?" Inlé asked. "No, mother, he would not. But on his notes, I spotted a bit saying 'extreme emotional imbalance generating delusional behaviors'. That's psycho-babble for crazy."

Inlé began to walk to his room as his mother called after him. "Inlé! You looked at his notes? Why would he allow such a thing?"

Inlé said, "He didn't. I spotted it as I was leaving. Face it, mother. I'm as mad as a porridge knife. Oh," he paused. "My next appointment is on the twenty-sixth at three. I'll be home late, as I have a date." He pushed his door open.

"A date, huh? And the girl is ... ?"

Inlé looked at his mother. "The attendant at the doctor's office. She asked me as she made my next appointment. I just went along with it."

"So it's just something to do? Nothing special?" His mother looked disappointed.

"No," Inlé agreed, "nothing special. Probably a one time thing. I have other things to do now, though. Goodnight." He stepped into his room and closed the door.

"What about dinner," his mother called.

"Not hungry," Inlé answered. "Not eating." Inlé leaned back against his door and looked over his room.

It was a small room, as would be expected in an apartment, with white walls and a white carpet. There was a small window against the wall opposite the door, where hung simple white drapes. Against one wall was a twin-sized bed, perfectly made, with white sheets. Beside him was a full-door dresser, bone white, as tall as he was. There was nothing to show that anyone lived in this room. There was no dust, though it was never cleaned. It was sterile, pristine, lifeless.

Inlé let his long hair down, sat cross-legged in the middle of the floor, and placed his hands palm-up in his lap. After a moment, his hair began to stir, swirling around his head in the windless room. The flurry controlling his hair lifted Inlé off of the ground, and his head began to glow. Inlé became translucent as the room around him wrinkled like wet paper. Then he became solid once more as his hair stretched and straightened behind him. The room became black, and swirled about him like water entering a drain, and vanished, leaving Inlé nowhere, with his hair a disk behind him, with all the colors of existence pouring through the gaps. His eyes tore open as his green eyes glared at something before him that none but he could see. Those eyes flickered orange for a moment, and a new world grew around him.

*****

I haven't slept in that bed in the four months I've lived here. When I sleep, which is rare now, I avoid lying down; it allows the blood to become more sluggish, slows the waking reflexes. Not that I dislike the rest brought on by sleep, though dreams rarely grant me peace. I'm simply too busy.

Most youth my age are working registers, flipping burgers, washing dishes, or stocking shelves. I sometimes wish my job was so tedious. Not that my job is really that bad. At least there's never a dull moment. There's little money involved, and no real benefits--as a normal person would see them. The hours are painful, often interfering with school, and I'm allowed no personal life as I am always on call. It's almost like being top-secret military or a superhero, but not as 'cool'.

I am a Worldwanderer. The Worldwanderer. I basically hold the title of existence's janitor. And existence always needs someone to take out the trash.

*****

Inlé looked expressionlessly over a cityscape of ruin. The world around him looked more a painting from the surrealist movement than any sane world. The city before him was large, with a plethora of skyscrapers. But many of them were broken, fractured bones jutting from the flesh of the surrounding city.

A rash of fires pocked the city, releasing acrid black smoke up into the purple and grass-green sky. Pinkish-white fog flowed through the city streets and sent large drops of acid rain racing toward the stars.

In the sky itself, an enormous gash had been torn open, and it bled over the city. Though the sun was high, the moon was draped over a nearby tree. The tree itself was enormous, leafless, and made of some sort of multi-colored crystal.

Bubbles of strange gasses floated about the city and the land around it. Anything they touched became warped and twisted. Stone burned, wood melted, fire froze. Cars sprouted flowers after being half-turned inside out. When the bubbles floated on, the things they touched would return to the forms they had had before being exposed. But not always.

As Inlé looked for whomever had requested his presence, he listened to the screams of people fleeing in terror from horrors that were--quite likely--very dangerous and--surprisingly as likely--very much as afraid of the chaos around them as those who fled.

He heard a footstep and turned, unsurprised to see a giant man with a large mouth standing behind him. The man stood over Inlé, looking down at him with cold, dead eyes.

Inlé turned and placed a fist over his heart. "Lord Masod," he said. "What service need you of me?"

Masod glared down at Inlé. "I know you see what this world looks like now. How can you ask 'what service' we need of you? We may indeed need you now, mortal. But that will not be for long."

Inlé said, "As you say, sir. Certainly I have never been to this world before. If my methods seem strange, pray account them to my foreign upbringing, and forgive me my ignorance."

Masod glared down at Inlé for a moment longer, then said, "You at least speak well. Come, follow me to my brethren."

With a wave of one talon-like hand, Masod disappeared in a puff of smoke.

Inlé stood for a few moments, unmoving, when Masod returned.

"Well?" Masod asked. "What is the matter now?"

Inlé punched his heart again. "Apologies, Lord, but I am unable to follow you in that manner. I have not the power."

"Then how did you get here?" Masod asked.

Inlé answered impassively, "By order, Lord. I was called, and I came. But I have not power enough to do so with utter frequency. It would destroy me."

Masod looked Inlé up and down with apparent disdain. "I am amazed that we even requested the aid of such a weakling as this. Very well, I will carry you. You will not enjoy this."

In a third puff of smoke, Masod transformed into a vulture larger than a bull. He flapped his wings to get aloft, grabbed Inlé up roughly with his vicious talons, and began to fly.

Their flight took them away from the city and into a more normal looking wilderness, though the sun seemed to stay just in the corner of Inlé's eye whichever way he looked, as if it moved with them. The sky stayed that strange color as well.

Minutes of flight over forest and desert brought the two to a mountain that climbed well above anything around it. To its summit Masod flew and, reaching that, into the amphitheater there.

After unceremoniously dropping Inlé onto the central dais, Masod transformed back to his black-robed form and took the leftmost of five thrones in front of where Inlé was standing.

All about him sat deities, Inlé knew, as he stood the spectacle on the platform. The five thrones before him were filled by three goddesses and two gods, one being Masod.

Inlé faced these five when he quietly addressed his audience. "Lords and Ladies, I greet you all. I am the Worldwanderer, and I have been called here for a reason. May I then ask, what service need you of me?"

Above the clamor of the host surrounding him, the god occupying the central throne answered Inlé, "As you can see, Wanderer, we are many. A host here to rule this world, and rule it we do. Each has been born into their duties and has been faithful to fulfill the expectations of their followers.

"But something has become of one among us that we cannot cope with ourselves. Much as I am pained to admit, we do not know how to control this catastrophe that has befallen us. So we call you."

Inlé punched his heart as he said, "Truly I am honored to serve you all. What is there to correct?"

"You see," said the goddess in the rightmost throne, "one of our ranks has died. Of itself, this is not unusual. Rensyd rules the flow of reincarnation that controls the cycle of life and death on this world. Because of this, he must regularly die himself and be reborn, that he experience this and understand better his subjects.

"But a few days ago, as he lay dying, a man approached him and somehow captured the soul of Rensyd at the moment of his death. That this ... method is used to prevent the reincarnation of an enemy or to preserve an ally that then may be returned to life instead of reincarnated was known to us. But we did not know that such a thing could work on one of we gods.

"Worse, the man consumed Rensyd's soul, taking on his powers, shirking his responsibilities, and, we fear, killing Rensyd ... forever."

The goddess beside her stirred then. "That we are capable of stopping this once-mortal, we are quite certain, understand. But he has some means of robbing us of our powers. With the powers of Rensyd added to him, we do not know what methods he may be capable of using to steal our powers."

The third goddess, seated between Masod and the central throne said, "What is more, as he does indeed possess the powers of Rensyd, merely to seal his soul away would not benefit us in any way. Mortals would still die, but none would be born. Eventually, all living things of this world would die."

Masod concluded the explanation, saying, "And killing him will do next to nothing, as he decides where and when he would be reborn. We would be forced to lie in wait for him as our world dies around us."

"So we come to you, Wanderer," the first god said. "Though it chagrins no few of our ranks that a mere mortal should save we gods from this danger, we--I--humbly beg your assistance in this."

The god rose, his splendrous robe shining like the sun, and approached the dais. He dropped to his knees before Inlé, saying, "Please, I beg you. Rensyd was--and is--my son. First of my children, and I love him still."

Inlé, impassive, looked down at the god at his feet. "Lord Namryd, please. It is not right for one such as yourself to beg. Please, stand. I am not worthy of this display."

Namryd rose, looking pleadingly at Inlé. He asked, "But you will help us?"

"As best I can, Lord," Inlé answered. "As best I can.

"May I assume he is in the city where I first arrived?"

"Yes," the first goddess answered. "Will you need anything from us for this confrontation?"

"I will. Be ready to grant me some small supports as I need them, please. I do not yet know what that need will be, nor if it truly will be needed. But if I am to need something, may I trust that you will supply me so long as it does not endanger you in the process?"

It was Masod who answered then, "And how will you send your requests? Or discern what will and will not endanger us?"

"Surely, Lord Masod," Inlé said, "you receive your prayers through the same channels as before, do you not?"

Masod stood angrily. "You insult me, mortal?"

Inlé punched his heart. "Not at all, Lord. I merely answer your question. If, Lords and Ladies, I need anything from any of you, you will find yourself in my prayers, so to speak."

A voice from the crowd called, "And how will you know who it is you need?"

Inlé turned to face the speaker, far from the center of the amphitheater. He answered, "I will know, Lord Phask, when I need to. But I will not know any sooner. That is the best I can explain.

"It is also," Inlé continued, turning back to face the thrones, "the way I will know whether my request would endanger you, Lord Masod."

Inlé shifted, his stance. "Now, if I may, I would like to get this first portion finished quickly. Lords and Ladies, I beg your pardon as I take my leave. I will return when I have recovered Lord Rensyd--in whatever form he may now be--or discern it an impossibility.

"I pray to see you all soon."

Inlé dropped down through the dais, disappearing from the amphitheater.

Masod growled. "I thought he said he couldn't jump place to place."

"Patience, Masod," Namryd said. "He spoke truly."

The god pointed to a shoulder-wide ring in the dais where the mortal had vanished. "It seems our mortal has some tools to at least make his job less difficult."

"Humph," Masod said. "The boy's still smug."

Inlé dropped up into the air above where he had first arrived. He nimbly righted himself in the air to land above the ring he had fallen through. He grabbed the ring up and shrunk it back to the size of a bracelet, which he returned to his wrist.

Inlé headed down to the city, emotionlessly cool. As he approached, he began to pray, "Lady Thyacin, find for me what I seek. Grant me the favor of the hunt. Lord Namryd, see for me when I cannot see myself. Grant me the favor of the sun. Lady Lanie, grace me with flight, for I may need it. Grant me the favor of the wind."

He leapt into the air then, and hung. For a moment, Inlé moved lightly, learning how he could move in his flight. Then he continued into the chaos before him.

Floating above the screaming people as they ran past--chased, no doubt, by their own demons--Inlé looked for the menace causing the chaos. He was untouched by the plight of those around him, feeling not even pity as he saw a man torn apart directly in his path.

Higher Inlé flew, into the pink clouds and the rain above them, searching. Higher still, until he was in the impenetrable darkness of the riling smoke. For a moment, he could not see. Then his vision changed to some other spectrum, and the smoke no longer bothered his eyes.

There. By the tear in the sky, Inlé saw someone floating and drinking its blood as it poured out. Inlé knew the man and called to him.

"Larjam," Inlé said, as he approached the once-man. "Or should I say Lord Larjam? You do consider yourself a god, I suppose."

Larjam turned his blood-smeared face toward Inlé. Wild golden eyes stared coldly at emotionless green ones. "I am he. Who are you?"

"No one of importance," Inlé answered. "May I ask how it is you now have such power?"

"It is mine!" Larjam cried, cackling wildly and frothing the blood around his mouth. "It is mine, and none of you can stop me! Come at me in ones and twos, and I will take you all in ones and twos!"

He lunged at Inlé, who sidestepped the attack with little effort. Larjam received a kick to the ribs for his trouble.

"I have no desire to fight you, sir," Inlé said. "All I wish to do is talk."

"That's what you all want, isn't it? To talk. Talk, talk, talk." Larjam flapped his hands at each other madly. Purely, simply mad.

His eyes became clear--insanely sane--as he looked back at Inlé. "But that isn't what you want at all, is it? You want my power. That's what this is about, isn't it? This power I have that I took.

"I. I took. Not you. Not anyone else. It's mine, and you can't have it. No one else can. This world will die with me, and I will take everything with me. As I took those who came before you."

Inlé moved just out of reach of the next lunge, this one much closer than the last. "Others came before me? How many?"

"How many, how many," Larjam mimicked. "You know well, you do. You don't fool me. No! not fool me at all. I know."

"Know me, Larjam? Not likely. This is my first time in this world. You, of all, should be able to tell this. Have I ever been in your domain? You would feel the connection, would you not? You can feel the rest of this world. Can you feel me, Larjam?"

Confusion washed over the mad godling's face. "No ... From outside? There is no outside. No outside. Who ... what are you?" He lunged at Inlé with renewed fervor. "No outside! None! No gods! Silly girl, there are no gods! If there were, why are they not seen?"

Larjam no longer saw what was around him. Trapped in his own mind, in his own hell, all he could do was attack this newest offense to his sensibilities. He swung wildly, but Inlé evaded the attacks with increasing difficulty as they became more focused. And faster.

"No outside! There can't be! Impossible! You'll believe anything, won't you? Are you stupid? Do you take me for such a fool?" His hand caught Inlé's sleeve, and held it. His face curled into a snarl. "You're mine! How can you go to someone else? No! I'll prove to you I'm right! Then you must love me. Look only at me!"

Inlé's sleeve was torn off at the shoulder as he was pulled toward the demented Larjam. Inlé saved himself by leaping off Larjam's growing chest.

And grow it did. Larjam tripled in size in a matter of moments, crackling with divine energy, cackling with human madness. "You will die, outsider! I will destroy you and your outside! As I destroyed the five who came to take my powers before you! Come at me in numbers, come at me alone. I will destroy you utterly."

He rushed forward again, and this time Inlé was too slow to get out of the way. Down the two plummeted, crashing into the city streets below. From the crater rose the mad Larjam, cackling madly. "Fool! This is the fate of those who oppose me!"

The calm voice from above surprised him. "What fate is that, Larjam? Please, celebrate my death when my death is confirmed, not before." Inlé slowly lowered to stand a short distance from Larjam, adjusting the bracelet on his wrist.

"Impossible," Larjam gasped. "I had you. Had you. No one can live from a fall that height."

"Then I did not fall," Inlé answered. "Larjam, listen to reason. I wish only to speak with you. Where, pray, is the danger in that? What did I say to convince you I was an enemy? Perhaps I am an ally. Think reasonably."

Larjam calmed, but the madness was chaos in his eyes. They flickered through the spectrum as they looked at things, eyes opposing the colors they saw. "Ally. Yes. That would be good. There is so much to do. So much. Help is good."

"Good. Yes, it is. But if I am going to help you, you must let me be like you. Is that fair?"

"Fair. Like me. Yes. How, like me? Like me how?" Larjam's faculties had not entirely abandoned him. He was still shrewd, Inlé saw. Inlé was suddenly glad that his enemy was mad. The madness would aide him.

"You want to destroy these ... gods."

"There are no gods!" Larjam bellowed.

"Yes. There are no gods. But ... I can not kill them. I do not know how. How did you kill them. If I were your ally, would you not tell me?"

"Are you my ally?"

Inlé paused, wondering if a direct lie that his foe was already inclined to disbelieve would be too apparent. Or whether one of the gods killed would be able to discern lies. But there were always backdoors. "Would you like me to be?"

Larjam stared quizzically at Inlé for a long moment. "What are you called?"

Inlé replied automatically. This was an answer he had. "I am called many things. I am often called the Worldwanderer. I am sometimes called useful, always called reliable, and occasionally called friend. But titles matter little, what might you call me?" No lies. Honest, but vague. Give nothing away.

Larjam laughed. "Very well, wanderer--Wanderer! I like that. Very well, I will tell you how I stole the power of my first god."

Inlé listened as Larjam told his story. He--Larjam--had studied the scriptures pertaining to the god Rensyd. It was in them that he learned that once every few generations, this god died on a mountainside, so he could know the flow of mortality. It was in them that he found the pattern that allowed him to determine where that mountainside was, and that the next death would come in his lifetime.

And he waited. Waited a year, telling those who listened that he would disprove the gods. Waited until he left for the mountain alone, to face the nothingness that was said to be a god. And there he waited for anything to happen.

But he was far from overjoyed to meet a fellow traveller on the mountainside. A tall man, young looking, but with eyes that were too old. The two talked for a time, watching the sunset. And as the sun set, the man beside Larjam laid down and died. Larjam did not know what to believe at the moment, so he believed that the man was only a figment of his imagination.

He disbelieved and disbelieved until he believed the man to be a part of himself. But as Larjam rose, he again touched the dead man. And believed the man was truly himself, and not another person. And the man ceased to be.

It was only days afterwards that a second man appeared, telling Larjam to return the god Rensyd. Larjam argued that there was no god Rensyd, having forced disbelief into a partial amnesia.

The man revealed himself a god, though, and forced Larjam to remember his night on the mountainside. Larjam was driven mad by this revelation. And his madness and his stolen divinity gave him the power to kill the man before him.

But his shattered mind could not believe he was capable of such murder--not yet, at any rate--and his disbelief pulled the other god into himself, granting this once-mortal more power. And more madness.

"See, Wanderer? I am as I always was! Only the world around me has weakened! I am the same today as I was yesterday, and life is no different from birth to death and beyond."

"I thought you said there was nothing after death."

Larjam howled. "There is nothing after death! Nothing!"

"Then how is that the same as life?" Inlé asked.

"Life is nothing also! Everything is nothing, and all of it is not!"

Inlé stood calmly watching this insane man-god. He stood silent for a long time, as opposite him the frayed edges of a beleaguered psyche seeped from the cracks of their host and burst like sparklers all about.

He shifted as he said, "So. Disbelief is enough to draw the power of your enemy into yourself. This you believe and understand to the degree that it has become truth. I am sorry."

Inlé began to walk slowly toward Larjam. "Truly, I am sorry. You have done nothing wrong in all of this. In the least, not deliberately. You followed protocols never before acknowledged, but nonetheless existent in this realm. After the theft of power, though ...

"There you made a mistake, Larjam." Inlé shook his head. "Had you adhered to your newfound responsibilities, you would be blameless. But you chose instead to deny even your responsibilities. Laws are laws. Here you must be punished."

Larjam's eyes bulged when he found himself unable to move as the strange boy before him advanced. Retreat was impossible, and he could feel it. Knew it to be true. "What have you done to me, Wanderer? What have you done?"

Inlé shook his head, his stony visage eternally emotionless. "You do not understand, do you, Larjam? I have no intention of aiding you. I was brought here for the purpose of removing you from the equation. I am here to erase you."

Larjam's rage was complete. Breaking free of whatever hold Inlé had had on him, the man-god attacked wildly. Inlé did his best to react before he was torn asunder, but his adversary's potential was rapidly developing.

Inlé was grabbed and flung by the ankle, tearing silver shoe and soft flesh. He hurtled through the air, muttering quiet prayers to every god in turn.

Larjam charged wildly, slashing, grabbing, lunging at Inlé. Occasionally, his rage would bleed off of him in a concentration of hatred so strong as to become a living thing striking independently at Inlé. Buffeted and battered, Inlé weathered the storm manifest by his foe's fury. The storm circled the two, tearing at Inlé's body, forcing him into positions allowing easy attacks for Larjam.

Then, subtle as the first frost, sudden as the first snap, Inlé was released from his storm-wrought bonds. He was able to move freely again, and gained control of himself. Larjam's final blow did not land as so many had before. Instead, Inlé captured it between his hands.

A trickle of blood spilled from his mouth as Inlé said, "My last prayer be to Lord Masod. Grant me the power to appraise this soul before me. Bless me with the favor of the court, over which you yourself do preside. And may my judgement be upheld upon this world, even unto its foundations."

Inlé closed his eyes. "Larjam, Usurper and Lord of many facets, I do thus find you guilty of theft of power not meant for such as yourself, of invalid use of such power as was achieved, and of damaging the surrounding world in blatant disregard to the warp and weft of said world with said power. The punishment for this crime is death, that the possibility of a return to equilibrium may be realized.

"I am sorry, but you are now dead."

And with that, Larjam died. The souls bound within the fragile human body tore out at their release, flaying their former host as they did so. His remains crumpled to the ground, a puddle of refuse no longer human. Without so much as a glance at the remains, Inlé turned and began to repair the damage about him.

He climbed first to the tear in the sky. Putting his hands upon it, he said, "This wound will not do you justice, Lord Sky. I thus take it upon myself, that your recovery would be accelerated." The festering, bleeding wound closed quickly, a bloodshot eye, closing to rest.

Inlé grunted in pain as the flesh across his chest audibly tore in time with the closing of the sky's injury. A red patch grew on his jacket front.

"Now," Inlé said, "where to begin? I have much to do, repairing this damaged world."

"So you have disposed of the renegade?"

"I have, Lord Masod," Inlé answered, once more on the dais among the gods. He stood at attention, emotionlessly prepared for the questions that would be sent his way before he could return home.

The first goddess spoke, "And what of those absorbed? Is their fate, then, lost? Are we all to fall away, now?"

"Lady Bremudaia, the souls removed are stored here." Inlé held up a hand containing ten silver coins. Each coin was of slightly different size and shape, and each held a different face, one being Larjam's.

"Impressive," Namryd said. "I am surprised you knew how to do that, Wanderer."

"Truly, I did not, Lord," Inlé answered, "until the need arose. Now, try a thousand times, I would be unable to repeat the feat. This power I have is fleeting."

"Still," the goddess beside Masod said, "that you were able to do so once to so many souls at once is a feat above any a mortal has hence done in this realm."

"Save one, good Lady Thyacin," Inlé answered. "Save one."

"And what, pray," Masod sneered, "was that? Your repairs to our world? That is also a powerful feat."

"Three laws broken, one bent, and seventy-three manipulations of powers, Lord."

A voice in the crowd called out, "A pity you don't charge by the challenge!" A murmur went up around the court.

Inlé turned and punched his heart, saying, "Lord Danym, were I to charge in such a way, there would be few even among your varied peers able to aptly compensate. But I truly would have little use for what I would be paid for such services."

Masod grunted. "Whether or not that were true, you have not told us what you believe is a more impressive feat, boy. Well?"

Inlé returned to facing the five thrones. "Lord, truly, this should be of no surprise, but I find the abilities of the late Lord Larjam surpass all feats aforementioned outright."

The dismay from the gods filling the amphitheater shook the mountain it sat upon to its roots. The pressure of this display of power nearly crushed Inlé's body, though the only evidence of his being affected were his wounds spurting a small amount of blood before he stopped it with a wave of his hand over his heart.

"Am I then to believe, Wanderer," Namryd began, "that you ... admired this man? That you held some sort of respect for him?"

"Admiration, Lord, none. A lawbreaker is a lawbreaker, and I have no tolerance for such activity ..."

"I see," Namryd said, sounding relieved.

"... But," Inlé continued, "I do indeed respect him in that he was able to find a loophole in governance of this universe and exploit it. His methods were, initially, wholly lawful. Unfortunately, his madness drove him to outright shatter some of the laws.

"And his ability to manipulate powers newly discovered within himself to such a degree as to break things to the degree that they were broken surpasses my meager, though honed, skills being used to repair them. It was much easier to repair them than to break them."

Masod leapt from his seat. "You envy the bastard!"

"I do not," Inlé replied.

Masod prowled around the central dais. "You want his power for yourself!"

"I do not," Inlé replied.

"And did you learn how he acquired his powers?" Masod asked, in a suddenly oily voice.

"I certainly did, Lord," Inlé replied.

"So you could use it against us?"

"I could not, Lord."

"And what is it that would prevent you, Wanderer?" asked the goddess beside Bremudaia.

Inlé punched his heart as he answered, "Even had I not closed that loophole when I discovered it, I am not capable, Lady Lanie, of doubting your existence. I do not know of any who could so strongly disbelieve as that man has done."

"Masod, sit," Namryd ordered. Masod obeyed. "So, Wanderer, how are we to retrieve our brethren from your coins?"

"Lord, you need only call to them as I hold up the coin. I believe they will manifest of their own will upon your summons."

"It is almost too simple," Bremudaia said. "Wanderer, may I see one of the coins before we call them? I wish to see how you so cleanly sealed them."

"Certainly, Lady. Have you a preference as to whom you would like?" Inlé opened his palm.

"Just throw me any of them--except for Larjam" She shuddered slightly as she said the name. A coin was thrown.

"And speaking of him," Thyacin said, "What is to be done with him? Must he be freed?"

"Lady, he need not be released," Inlé answered. "But, had I the choice--which I do not, having not the power to do so--I would return him to the cycle of lives. Merely releasing him under different circumstances could bring him to cause great good, even as he has done great harm.

"Imagine, if you would, his unbelief which gave him the power to steal your own turned to belief. His conviction--his certitude--could greatly benefit your causes were he a follower. Releasing him into a place where he would be raised devout may be beneficial. And, were it possible, I would return him to a place away from the woman he follows so doggedly. If only as a kindness."

"Perhaps we shall," Namryd mused. "But let us begin with the others for now."

The calling took only a short while for each coin to dissolve as its relative god emerged unscathed. Eight callings went perfectly. Then the last god was to be called.

"At last," said Namryd. "My son returned to me. Rensyd, come."

The coin shook and glowed. A voice called, "No."

Another commotion arose with the gods' shock.

"What?" Namryd cried. "You defy me?"

"Father, I do," The voice said. "Please, let me die. Let me die and forget. I do not wish to go through this painful cycle again."

Namryd's face looked as if it would break. "Son, why? Why must you do this?"

The coin shook, "You do not understand, father. Death is painful, even dying peacefully. And birth ... Babies do not cry without reason."

Namryd said, "Is there no way I can convince you to stay?"

Rensyd replied, "None, father. I can no longer stand this as I am. I am not so strong as you need me."

Inlé cleared his throat. "If I may be so bold, Lord Rensyd, would a companion aid in your ability to tolerate this?"

The coin hummed in Inlé's palm. "... A companion?"

"If, say, there was another god who grew with you, lived with you, perhaps even died with you. Perhaps they would share your discomforts, but perhaps that would lessen the sting from both of your pains."

Namryd said, "Do you mean yourself, Wanderer?"

"Alas, no. While such a prospect is to some desirable, I am not able to fill such a position. I am not for such things."

"But to create a god, boy," Masod said, "that is a thing quite difficult. And even were one of us to bear a child, even from Rensyd's own seed, there would be little hope he would share that position."

"Then, Lord, we merely split the original. A suggestion: using a host soul, we channel a small portion of Rensyd into this other soul. We then allow the portion to consume the other soul and grow into a near exact replica of the original. The soul consumed would not be destroyed, but remolded into something more.

"This of course would be dangerous, as using a weak soul may cause Rensyd to lose his expended power by destroying the soul utterly. Also, if the portion is not properly removed, Rensyd will not regenerate it.

"But, Lords and Ladies, we even have a soul capable of fostering this seeding process available."

"Wanderer, you don't mean to suggest ..." the goddess choked on the name.

"Yes, Lady Lanie, I do," Inlé said. "Larjam has already shown the capacity for his soul to contain a deity's power. If properly administered, he may not be such a ... problematic participant.

"Would this suffice, Lord Rensyd?"

"Would you be able to do this, Wanderer? Could you transfer the power?"

Inlé paused. His emotionless face was unreadable, but it was understood that he was calculating the odds of success. The gods grew silent.

After a long, restless wait, Inlé answered, "I could, perhaps." Then, so quietly that only Rensyd in his hand could hear, "There is an eighty per cent chance the power would be transferrable. Within that is a thirty-five per cent chance that power will be regenerated within you, and a separate fifty-eight per cent chance that the power will become manifest in the new soul. This means that the optimal outcome has just less than a thirteen per cent chance for success."

Rensyd asked quietly, "How much less?"

"Eight thousandths of one per cent. Meaning the odds are twelve point nine-nine-two per cent in your favor."

"Not exceptional odds to stake my soul on."

"No, Lord."

"Well, it can't be worse than dying, I suppose."

"That, Lord, I would not know."

"Be thankful for that," Rensyd said. Then he said more loudly, "Very well, I will try it. Father, would you call us out?"

The last two coins dissolved, and Rensyd and Larjam emerged, Larjam unconscious.

"It was my belief," Inlé explained, "that were you to return this man to the cycle, you would want an easy way to kill him before he could resist."

"Drat!" Bremudaia said. "I should have looked at his coin too, after all."

"Lady, I am sure you will quickly find the method used to do this."

"Doubtless," Namryd agreed. "Now, Inlé, please begin the process."

"I will, Lord," Inlé answered, punching his heart.

Inlé returned to his room shearing through the boundary between this reality and the other, two feet above the ground, legs and arms crossed. His hair, now the pastel colors of the sunset, hung straight down, untied, and blood trickled lightly from his scalp.

Blood and the various colors of sunset and aurora were visibly splattered over his tattered hoodie, which had lost half the left sleeve and the entire right one, revealing the black tee shirt beneath.

His left pant leg was torn up the inseam and again down from the center of the back pocket, causing a strip to dangle nearly to the ground. His right shoe was missing, and that foot oozed dark, half-dried blood.

Landing lightly, he inspected himself. After removing his clothes, he stood naked over the pile of ruined clothing with a dozen small silver bracelets hanging around his left wrist.

The gash across his chest stretched from his left collarbone to the bottom rib on the right, deep and slowly oozing. Numerous smaller nicks and scratches covered his arms and torso, and his ankle's wound was deep. He was somewhat bruised as well, and his eyes were sunken with fatigue.

He dabbed his ruined shirt against his wounds, then pulled a small knife and a needle from the sleeve of his hoodie. With the knife, he removed a single, long thread from the seam of the hoodie. He then began to sew his large wound closed.

From the door, Inlé's mother called in, "Inlé! I just heard a crashing noise just now. Is something the matter?"

"No, mother," Inlé responded, "I"--He inhaled sharply as he pulled the needle through--"am fine. I just knocked something out of the dresser." He hissed again, then called, "Hey, what is this anyway? Did you put a little statue in my closet?"

From behind the locked door, his mother called, "What? Let me see what you're talking about!"

Inlé finished closing his wound and replied, "Hold on, I was changing. Just let me finish first. And comb my hair. I will be out in ten minutes with it. Okay?"

"Okay," his mother replied calmly.

Inlé quickly closed the hole in his ankle, rose, and opened his bureau. Inside were a dozen sets of clothing identical to those on the floor behind him, save clean. A shelf above them stored an equal number of identical pairs of Inlé's silver shoes. Removing two sets of clothing and one pair of shoes, he hung one set on the door, and donned the other with the shoes. Within the bureau, a dozen sets of clothing hung beneath an equal number of shoes.

Reaching into his sleeve, Inlé pulled out a comb and brushed the sunset colors out of his hair and onto the pile of ruined clothes. Finishing, he returned the comb to his sleeve and threw the second set of removed clothing over the mess.

He stared at the pile for a moment, then muttered to himself as he knelt, "Now for the cover-up."

He began tracing a circle on the ground, by dragging some of the liquid aurora with his finger. "Simple, yet pretty." He traced a square circumscribed within the circle. "Marble, perhaps?" He circumscribed a diamond within the circle, None of the eight points touched. "A unicorn." He traced a symbol into each point, starting from the top and writing counter-clockwise: α, σ, τ, α, τ, υ, ε, ◦.

Leaning back, he looked down at the hasty circle. "That should work. Here goes ..."

Inlé knelt over the circle and whispered, "Tsaf ti deen I .Seye erihppas eslaf htiw elbram etihw .Nrocinu a fo eutats a em dnes ,Ydal ,esaelp"

The circle glowed, flashing the colors of the fluid used to trace it. Slowly the circle warped and melted into nothingness as a small statue took form.

The statue was a life-like rendition of a unicorn, apparently carved from white marble, and with blue sapphire eyes. It stood lightly, as if frozen while grazing. It was beautiful. But the aurora-fluid had left its smear on the beast, streaking the white surface with pastel reds and greens and blues. These streaks, though, made it more beautiful still.

Picking the statue up, Inlé muttered, "It is a sloppy job at best, but I did rush it. Ah well."

He went to the door, and opened it to find his mother standing in front of it. Inlé lifts the statue and asked, "Is this your way of giving me a secret present or something?"

Staring at the statue, his mother responded, "No. I've never seen anything so pretty before. It really is lovely."

Inlé agreed, "It is that. Well, maybe it was something meant for you that I forgot about. It is yours."

His mother looked up at him happily as she took the statue. "Thank you, it's very pretty. I'm glad you remembered I like ..."

Her face suddenly darkened as she looked at his face, "Inlé! I can't believe you! Oh, I ought to just box your ears for this! You didn't even go to the psychiatrist's did you? You were off fighting or stealing, weren't you? Is this stolen?"

Inlé replied expressionlessly, "What? What do you mean? You do not believe me?"

"Believe you?" his mother cried. "You're bleeding out of the forehead and God knows where else, and you wonder why I don't believe you? I'm just surprised I didn't see a gash that big when you came in!"

"Gash?" Inlé echoed. "Bleeding?" Sure enough, having forgotten to patch the wound on his forehead, Inlé had left it to bleed again.

His mother was furious. "Don't play dumb with me, you. You couldn't have not noticed that."

"Had I known I was bleeding, mother, I would not have come to the door," Inlé said. "You would flip ou ..." Then an idea came to him. "Ah! That must be from when the statue fell out."

Skeptic, his mother said, "I don't buy it. You'd have said something before if that were the case."

"No," Inlé said, "I did not think about it. The statue hit me in the head with one of its hooves and must have clipped me better than I gave it credit for. You had best be careful not to drop it on your foot or something. It would hurt a lot."

Wanting to believe, wanting to think her son wasn't a delinquent, Inlé's mother conceded. "Well, I guess that could be what happened. I'll trust you for now. But if I find out you're lying to me ..." The sentence dragged off, leaving the implied threat unsaid.

"You won't," Inlé assured her.

A quizzical eyebrow lifted and a brief smirk preceded her saying, "Oh? So you've tricked me that good, eh?"

"No," Inlé said. "I mean that I really did go to the shrink and all that."

His mother began to walk back toward the living room. She called over her shoulder, "All right, you win. I'm going to find a place to put this. You can go back to your homework."

"I don't ..." Inlé began.

"And don't you dare tell me you don't have any. I know you do."

Inlé closed the door behind himself muttering, "Five minutes go by here, fifty hours go by there. Fifty more straight hours without rest." He dropped down between a corner and his dresser, propping his his heels up against the dresser and his back against the wall. "I don't need homework, I need some sleep."

And sleep he did.