Objects of Desire: Epilogue – The Beginning
High atop the tower at the center of Ohtori, an envelope appeared atop Akio's desk. He noticed it a moment later, having heard nothing. The envelope's seal was made of wax so dark it seemed to suck the light from the room, and the wax bore the symbol of a strange oval helm with what appeared to be a creature's spine trailing down from its center.
Akio's hand twitched as he picked up the envelope. The Dream King's seal. This could be an answer to his challenge . . . or something else. From what he knew of Morpheus, it could be something else entirely.
He gave a low chuckle. Life was never without risk. Akio cracked the seal and pulled out a thin piece of black paper, and read the message written in shining white ink.
To Akio Ohtori:
Your offer of challenge is declined. Anthy and Utena both wish to have nothing further to do with you, and are under no obligation to speak to you again. I trust you will consider this matter settled, and will bother us no further.
Regards,
Morpheus
Akio crumpled the letter in his fist, the tense heat of sudden anger filling him. How dare he. . . ! Declining the challenge was the same thing as accepting the loss, so Anthy and Utena both should rightfully be his. He reached out, feeling for one of his creations and the one he'd spent so much time making his own–
Nothing. He felt nothing. Not a whisper of a presence, not a hint of where they'd been or where they were going. Once he'd known they were in the Dreaming, he'd been able to sense them, but now, they were gone.
Akio leaned back in his chair and stared up at the ceiling. His master was going to be most displeased.
"You cannot follow her," Morpheus said, and Utena bowed her head.
A moment later, she looked back up at him, determination in her eyes. "Why not?" she asked.
"You are in an . . . unusual state of being." Morpheus gave her a long look, considering. "You are not a dream, that much is clear, but I don't know if it would be appropriate to call you Akio's creation any longer. You simply exist."
"You didn't answer my question," Utena said, her expression unchanging. "You said Anthy's going to the waking world. Why can't I go after her?"
He frowned. "It's possible for a dream to inhabit a mortal, to overlay itself within a being's mind. I believe that's what Anthy intends, and by doing so, to hide from Akio. It would make her much more difficult to find."
"What happens to the person?" Utena asked.
"It depends." Morpheus gestured, and the scrying pool between them changed to a view of an enormous city, thousands of people and cars passing among buildings nearly tall enough to reach the sky. "Some change, some go insane. Some never realize that they have a passenger, some become something between who they were and who inhabits them. Most simply find themselves slightly different than they had been before."
Utena watched his face. By now, she could tell when there were things he wasn't saying. "But that wouldn't happen," she said slowly, "with a dream like Anthy, would it?"
"Most likely not," Morpheus said, "considering Anthy's gifts. Her ability to manipulate the Dreaming . . . I'm unsure if it would carry through to the waking world. She was never meant to go there.
"As for you," he continued, "I cannot be sure of what would happen were you to suddenly inhabit a mortal mind. Mortals' lives may be short, but I will not willingly inflict one with madness."
Utena thought back, briefly, to her time in Delirium's realm, and nodded. That was too much. "What if," she asked, "you put me in someone who wouldn't know? A baby, or something like that. So they could grow up with me – this all sounds so strange."
Morpheus gave her a contemplative look, stars swirling around the borders of his eyes. "That has some potential," he said. "You would not remember your former life."
Utena sighed. "I guess you're right. And if Anthy's going to the waking world now, then I'd be too young, and we'd probably never meet each other. But in her dream, she wanted to go to the real world so badly. . . ."
Morpheus shook his head, and reached into one of his deep sleeves. He withdrew a small sphere of crystal, which held an image of a road passing through a wrecked landscape, dirty clouds floating overhead. Utena looked more closely, and saw a tiny blur of mixed pink and purple. It was the end of Anthy's dream, with the two of them headed for the real world.
She looked at Morpheus, hope in her eyes.
"I feared Akio would find her if she fled too soon," he said, "so I've held her within her dream. If you wish, I will hold her until the time is right for her to find you again, and I will see to it that you know of what has been."
Utena swallowed past the sudden lump in her throat, and nodded. "Thank you," she managed.
"You will be in my debt," Morpheus said pointedly. "When the time comes, I will call upon you both to repay."
Somehow, Utena smiled at him. "I'll do it," she said. "We both will."
"Then give me your ring."
Utena looked down at the rose ring, then slowly pulled it off. She handed it to Morpheus, then stood watching him. She rubbed at the bare space on her finger. It seemed so strange to not wear the ring, even for a moment. Knowing she was taking it off for Anthy, however, made it all right.
Morpheus held the ring between his finger and thumb, tapped the rose seal against the crystal ball with Anthy's dream within it. The rose on the ring changed to pink crystal. He returned the sphere to his robe, then touched the ring to Utena's forehead.
"Be well, Utena Tenjou," he said. "You will have a second chance with the one you love, with the one who loves you. Not everyone gets that."
Before she had a chance to reply, Utena discorporated into a cloud of pink smoke, and slowly disappeared into the rose crystal on the ring. When she was gone, Morpheus manifested a chain around the ring, and hung it from his neck.
One final journey, he thought, and this business would be done.
He stepped out into the Dreaming, floated through the more stable areas until he reached a blurrier place, and found himself among the quietly gurgling dreams of newborns. Another step, and Morpheus stood unseen in a hospital nursery room.
He looked around at all the new life. Nearly three dozen babies, squirming or sleeping or laying at peace, attended by nurses with quiet, singsong voices. He walked among them for a moment, looking at the children and the names their parents had chosen for them, until he found a suitable one.
The child's name was typed onto the card as Katherine DuMonte, but just below that, a woman's hand had written in "Kara." A spirited parent, he thought, to give the girl a nickname at birth. She would find her child likewise spirited.
Morpheus touched the ring's crystal rose to the young one's forehead, and a faint shimmering passed into the girl's being. A flush of pink washed over her dusky skin and her mess of fine black hair, then was gone. The ring and the chain that held it disappeared.
The task done, Morpheus returned to the castle at the heart of the Dreaming, and entered the library. "Lucien."
Lucien appeared from between two of the rows of bookcases. "My lord?" he asked.
Morpheus sat himself in a chair before the fire. "Utena Tenjou has moved on from here. Bring me her story."
"Of course," Lucien said.
When Lucien returned, Morpheus took the book from him, and looked at the cover. The rose seal embossed there now sat below the book's new title: Revolutionary Girl Utena.
"Yes. This will do," Morpheus said, then stood and looked to Lucien. "See that I am not disturbed, Lucien," he said.
"I have dreamers to inspire."
Author's Note
First: my thanks for reading this story. To say it's been a long, strange trip would be an understatement, and it's not over yet, so I'm very glad for those of you who've come along for the ride.
The idea for this story first came from wondering about the similarities between Akio and Desire. They're a lot more alike than mere coincidence would allow for, and this got me thinking about what it would mean if Akio was one of Desire's creations, and what would happen because of that. I'm not sure where the idea of Anthy being a stolen dream came from, but it worked, and the rest was simply me running after a plot and putting down as much of it as I could.
In the end, I think everything works well, and working with both Gaiman's characters and those from RGU was a delight. Admittedly, the most difficult part was chapter five – the combination of the Akio-Desire scene and the trip into Delirium's realm meant that I had to go places I'd never been before as a writer. There are times when I'm simply glad I made it back. *grin* For the curious, the Desire-Akio scene was written with Muse's 'Supermassive Black Hole' on repeat, and the Delirium's realm scene was written with the help of a Mana Potion energy drink, which I will likely never drink again. Oi.
For those of you wondering about the second part of the trilogy, your wait will be a short one: it's already done and uploaded. Check my profile, it's titled 'By the Rose.' The few of you who read that story when I first wrote it several years ago will find some small changes if you decide to reread it; for those of you who haven't read it, well, I hope you enjoy it and that it defies your expectations.
Thank you again for reading. I hope you'll come along for the rest of the trip. It's only just begun.