Chapter 88: Chapter 87: Creation
The next time Carl woke up, everyone was surrounding him.
"Why do I feel like I’m in trouble?" He asked as he tried to sit himself up.
"Could be your wife pointing a gun at your junk..." Gillian mused, with a good amount of enjoyment at the tale he had heard.
"For once Gil is right, who was that girl?"
"I think it might have been Sis, but she isn’t speaking to me..." Carl trailed off as he began to wonder if it really could have been Sis in her manifested form.
"Carl... Your system was gone, if that was Sis and her manifesting means you lose your system, then it’s far too dangerous for everyone. Everyone close to you lost their system applied strength."
"So? Just means I’ll have to get far away from everyone before I release her. I don’t care how weak I get, I’m not going to keep her trapped in me, that would be cruel."
"Carl, Klaire, You both need to save that conversation for now, we need to get Carl back to Haven and debriefed." Leanna insisted.
"Fine..." Klaire answered, not taking her eyes off Carl. "Mummy can’t save you forever, this is going to be a big chat."
They returned to Haven and Carl recounted everything that happened up to the point he blacked out, then he recounted the error message and the one that said "Carl... It hurts". He then recounted what happened whilst he was unconscious.
He was surprised to learn he was out for so long, but not have as much as the immortals were when he reported his two new single-use skills.
"I’m going to learn those two first, then I’m going to ask Sis if she wants to be free."
At that point Klaire brought a swift end to the meeting and made it clear everyone else had outstayed their welcome.
"Klaire, I’m sorry, but if being my system is causing her pain then I’m freeing her."
"Why are you always so quick to go back to being an idiot these days? If you get rid of your system, who knows what will happen? We were all weakened, you might never recover and even if you d-"
"Even if I do, I’ll be weakened... Well, what would be worse; knowing my weakness, or my crippled and enslaved system failing me at a pivotal moment?"
"Well! When! You put it that way... GRRR! Carl, shut up! Sis, if you can manifest then please do it already, dressed if possible"
"I told you, she’s too weak right now, she i-"
[ SORRY KLAIRE, I CAN’T, I’M TOO EMBARRASSED... ]
"What do you mean, "embarrassed"?"
[ CARL SAW ME NAKED, I CAN’T EVEN SPEAK TO HIM WITHOUT GETTING FLUSTERED. ]
"Oh good grief. Carl, you need to apologise. Sis is embarrassed because you saw her naked."
"What? Nuh-uh, she has been in my head the past eight years, she’s seen more than a us naked! She should be the one apologising!"
After that the "big chat" as Klaire dubbed it, devolved into a bizarre sibling squabble, that resulted in Carl getting shot a couple of times into his stubbornness collapsed.
"Okay! Okay! I’m sorry Sis, please come out if you can, we need to see if I am going to be okay."
"Good, next time don’t make me shoot you, now close your eyes idiot... Unless you’re trying to see her naked you siscon perv."
"I’m closing my damn eyes, I don’t want to see her naked!"
"Oh, so now you’re trying to hurt her feeling just as she becomes sentient..."
"What? No. I ju... Know what, I’m gonna shut up, if everything I say is wrong I just won’t speak."
Klaire walked over and patted his head "There we go, next time don’t take so long... My little masochist. Now, come on out Sis, I want to meet my sister-in-law."
[ ERR, CAN YOU COVER HIS EYES MORE... ]
Klaire shrugged and pulled his face to her chest. "Well, he’s about as distracted as he’s gonna get, stop stalling."
The scene was hard for Klaire to put into words, she expected it to be like a summoning technique. In actuality, it was more like Carl was covered in a luminous afterimage, then divided into two separate beings.
As the newly manifested Sis grew red-faced at her repeat nudity, Klaire produced some spare clothes from her armlet, she had also forgotten that she was smothering Carl.
As Sis pulled on the loaned clothes however she jogged her memory. "Klaire, how long are you going to acoste my brother?..."
"Huh? Oh, right, shame..." Klaire released him and he fell back gasping, though his goofy grin didn’t go unnoticed by Sis.
"Ew."
"You two really are as similar as siblings. Now Carl, can you still use your system?"
When Carl confirmed, Klaire turned her attention towards Sis and asked her to explain the pain.
"It’s hard to describe, Carl worries too much and being his system never hurts, the issue was that my operations were invaded by something and I was forced to integrate unknown values. In order to facilitate them, I was forced to accumulate enough power to forcibly mature myself, I had to leech from Carl like a parasite to preserve us both."
"What are the chances you will suffer such a thing again?"
"Unlikely, I was designed to facilitate every known source of power..."
"...But these two "origin laws" were unknown to immortals and elder gods alike." Klaire sighed. "Now what should I do with you for being so ready to make yourself vulnerable?"
"Yeah! I’m mad about that too you know! Bad enough Ishtar made us, then we were thrown through time, then you want to leave me all alone here? You’re a jerk!"
"You’re both right, I’m a stupid jerk, and dumb too and quick to jump to conclusions. Now do you want me to use the single-use skills now or later?"
"Two days unconscious and that’s your first thought? Not your wife, or food, or checking on everyone else?"
"I already did,. It’s strange, but I can feel every one of the bonds I have with my pets a bit clearer. I’m not really all that hungry to be honest, got to admit that’s weird and as for the last thing, amazing how quickly being shot a few times kills the mood."
"Whatever you say masochist. Sis, do you have a time limit on manifestation, or limited functionality?"
"Nuh-uh, I should be fully operational and untethered, but I can always return if needed."
Carl could sense he had become a third-wheel in the conversation and asked if he would get shot if he used the skills. Klaire simply gestured at him to get on with it while continuing her chat with Sis.
"Acti-"
"Carl, can you stop speaking your skills out loud like some vid-protagonist already, just think about it and it’ll activate it.
"You tell me that now?"
"Well it was pretty obvious, it happened all the way back when you fought the wyvern."
Carl grumbled, then activated the skill for the law of creation...
Carl’s mind went dark and in the darkness words formed.
it was just the two of us in the beginning.
Myself and themself.
Alone in thought.
Carl saw a being of no distinct shape, texture, mass, size or colour... It was both subatomic and multiversal in scale.
We were the purest white and truest black and everything in between.
There was another.
I knew they existed.
We occupied the same form, thought the same things and felt the same things.
We were two separate entities, yet entirely indistinguishable from one another.
Carl watched as one became two.
At first, we weren’t sure who was who.
All we knew was one of us wanted a change and one of us created a plan.
When one became two, the who became clear.
I created the plan and the second body.
My counterpart made change possible.
Carl watched as the two identical entities simply existed.
We were no longer alone with each other,
yet we remained lonely together.
We didn’t understand why.
Then we realised that nothing had changed.
We still thought the same thoughts, felt the same things.
We became two and remained one and so he changed things and I created them.
Carl watched as two became ten.
I created once more and Change changed once more.
I created another, then split it into eight.
I then split itself into four and Change into four.
The eight new entities were a lesson for we two.
They may have been different but nothing had changed.
The eight and we two were still the same.
Creation had made but not created and Change had changed what remained the same.
Carl kept watching and ten became eight.
It was purely by chance that one touched another.
Creating something new, as I never did.
It wasn’t long before each one touched all and much was made and much changed.
It was when we touched the truth became clear.
Alone and lonely are two different things.
One can be lonely alone or in company and lonely we remained.
Lonely we were, jealous we became and so we retreated and became unknown.
The world fell back into focus, along with the voices of both Sis and Klaire...