Chapter Text
sleepwalker
the tower
- Guide -
Italics indicate thoughts, telepathy or flashbacks.
Bold represents a language other than english being spoken.
Bold italics is a mix of both telepathy or thoughts.
Underline is void-speak.
Light shines down in a circular beam from a gaping hole high above in the tower’s ceiling. Motes of dust ebb and flow like stardust, igniting in flashes of gold and silver as they dance in the draft coming from the skies above as it pours into the building. Its light bathes you in its ethereal glow. Is it not orange or yellow like home- home? Where is home, as far as you’re concerned this world has always been home but- instead it is a bright foreign white?
Despite its alien appearance, the sunlight still feels the same, pleasantly warm against your skin and you can only stare up with wide eyes. Pieces of connecting stone just out from the high up walls, and as your eyes adjust you can see the upper levels of the tower. Squinting against the bright light, you spot several unbroken spokes that makeup walkways crossing the central gap.
You want to see more so your turn on your heel in order to take in your surroundings. You are standing in a massive cavernous room. The walls are so old and ancient, with thousands upon thousands of intricate carvings decorating the worn stone. Tracking the carvings as your eyes move up and up to the ceiling where you expected them to halt. But to your surprise they didn't stop there, continuing to climb back out into the circular hole in the ceiling and beyond.
You wonder how you got here.
You wonder how long it took for the people to build and carve this place- You wonder and wonder -But there are no answers.
Stepping out of the light you stumble over rubble from the collapsed walkways, your boots kicking over small stones as the rubble crumbles at the edges. You carefully pick your way through the minefield and walk over to the walls. Holding your right hand out, you gently trace your fingers on the cracks and the carvings.
Upon a closer look, you realize that there are characters carved into the stone. No matter which way you turn your head to the side to try and read it like you would in your language. You just can't make heads or tails of anything that it says. You don’t think that you could understand them anyways if you could. Walking forwards, you allow your hand the ghost over the bricks, until you come across the northern part of the tower, it branches into a separate area and it reveals a wide-open space that reminds you of an auditorium.
There are cage looking structures lining the walls, built of sturdy basalt stone with not a single sign of cracks or defects. Looking almost brand new compared to the rest of the towers state. There are rods made out of solid gold, carefully bent, shaped and fused together, creating the gilded bars of the cage.
These massive cages are easily two or three times your size, you are so small compared to their might. Each of them contains large pieces of white stone, easily 30 feet tall. They're carved into large skeletal creatures, with metal accents around the limbs reminding you of shackles and chains. There are muzzles covering the snouts made out of black iron-like metal. In their pitch-black sockets, there are large gemstones of various colors mounted within them reminding you of the pupils in your own eyes. There are sixteen of them lined up on the walls. And not a single one looks exactly like another, each is a unique individual in its own right.
You wonder what they are. You wonder why they are chained up- Did they deserve it? Do they deserve to be locked up? -You don’t know.
As you pass the statues the gems in their eyes almost look like they are tracking you as you slowly walk by. A shiver goes up your spine as you pass one of them. It has two sharp crests curling up from the top of its skull made out of the same white stone that makes up its face, and a lower set of horns just behind where the ears should be made out of black stone, curling downwards like the horns of a ram. Bloody red rubies are placed in its eye sockets, somehow glittering in the low light. Its square jaw is full of sharp teeth and a single canine tooth in gold.
Taking a glance at its opposite on the other side, you tremble because the other one is even scarier. Made out of too sharp angles, its mouth contains a row of interlocking needle teeth. It has a similar set of horns like it’s other, the two on the top curving and twisting into wicked points. While the lower set is jagged like a bolt of lightning. Scary. You tear your eyes away from its dark sockets filled with that crimson light and continue forwards.
You’ll check out the other statues later when you’re not feeling so wary around the red-eyed ones.
Passing the final set of statues, the room widens into a circular area, another hole in ceiling beams light downwards. Staring upwards, you squint through the light once more and spot that the walkways are all whole, which makes sense considering that you are not standing on any rubble.
Glancing northwards, you notice how the room opens up to the outside world. There are wide open windows framed by columns of stone that tower high above and connect to the ceiling. Your eyes haven't adjusted fully, but you think that you spot stairs leading outside.
A table-like structure juts out from the floor, illuminated in the alien light shining from above. Compared to the rest of the tower, the table is... different in comparison. While the stone is made up of the same exact stuff that the rest of the tower is made up out of. What puts it at odds, however, are the runes that are carved along the sides and on the surface. Compared to the blocky and rigid carvings on the walls. The carvings on the sides are thinner, curving and spiraling in many concentric patterns. Painted with some sort of blue dye, but as you take a closer inspection you notice that the blue dye is actually a crystal-like substance.
You reach out with your hand and gently touch the blue swirls, and a soft gasp escapes your mouth when the symbols ignite in a bright blue. The light spreads outwards from the point of contact and you take several steps back when you hear a grinding-rumble. From the center of the table structure, you spot two of the circle symbols go from blue to white. The grinding sound continues and the two circles slowly but surely rise up from the table creating tiers. When it halts, the silence that leaves its wake fills you with wariness. A quiet click echoes through the silent space, and you swallow nervously when the upper layer of the circle depresses inwards revealing a circular slot.
Pulling off your satchel- when did you get that, how long have you been wearing that, where are you-you dig through the pouches until your fingers touch something icy cold. Huffing through your nose you grab the object and pull it out of your satchel. It’s spherical in shape, it’s made out of the same blue crystal that’s embedded within the runes, its cold to the touch and even though you hold it in your hands to look it over to check if there are any cracks, it never warms up.
The orb, now fully scrutinized feels suddenly like a crushing weight upon your body. Maybe it's the feeling in your heart, maybe it’s your soul. You cannot see your reflection within its reflective surface- it should worry you that you cannot see yourself. But this world is not yours or is it. Is it? who knows- so you turn it your hands one more time before you place it into the cradle.
The earth shakes under your feet, the runes igniting into a bright flare of golden light. The circular tiers sink back into the table. The orb, much like the runes bleaches into white. Light shoots from the orb and blasts skywards, sending the previously drafty wind into a flurry, blowing your hair back as well as your clothes. Squinting through the light, you lift up your arms to cover up your face as fast as you can because the light is blinding.
Gradually it comes to a stop, and the shaking of the ground beneath you grinds to a halt. The wind that was a fast-moving gale quickly became no more than a gentle breeze, gently moving your tousled hair back and forth. Tentatively you bring your arms down, and while the light is still glowing, it’s not as blindingly bright like it had been. You stare wide-eyed at the orb, or what had once been the orb, in its place is a large shard-like crystal. It’s easily as large as a- butcher knife -and its humming loudly.
You move forwards, head hazy entranced by the light and the feeling that’s radiating out of it. You reach out and your fingers brush against the crystal, warmth traveling through your entire body. The tower rumbles again, but you take no note of it because someone is speaking.
Iyo ha bei’na ailohn taime syi’nh soh’muoni ha'as dar’eid io ehn'tai eir ouhr domeian. Hou’gh ka dou, soumu’ningyo?
Thae'dii naika ahndo’syuka. Ouer lahn’gueiji iyo mata anteik.
Geito it ay moh’meit, thay whill understand. Ah, see?
Welcome traveler, We are the Reinohr.
You have entered our domain. It has been... a very long time since anyone has wandered into this land. It's forbidden for most species to wander into this place, yet here you stand before us. But you are not the first to come here. In our many years of continued existence, many have come through this tower.
However, Humans are rare. We have encountered countless mages, monsters, and mythical beasts. The brave ones, the foolish ones, they are common-place when they wander through this realm. But you? A human? You have no magic within your body like a mage or a monster, we've often encountered those whose magic has been tearing them apart from the inside out, yet you show no signs of magic corruption. You haven’t been bestowed with a mythical blade for a noble hero. No heritage that you are running from.
So why little human, why are you here? Do you have the answer?
You open your mouth, your skull full of haze as you spit out your answer. “I came here because I heard that-”
Whatever you said never manages to reach your ears.
An interesting quest, and a much rarer answer. You don’t want the magic power to destroy or control your foes. You don’t want prestige or recognition. You want to replace-? Yes. We can do that. However, you will need to do something for us. A series of tasks that you will have to do in order for you to get what you want.
“I’ll do it.” You speak, voice pleading- but you don’t know why - and begging. “Tell me what to do, please .”
So be it.
These tasks will take great fortitude and skill. Because you have not the ancient sword, you will have to use your wit and intelligence instead. Do not fret little one, you are not on a time limit so you will have plenty of time to train and hone your skills.
You will need to collect seventeen shards made out of elemental magic. Each of them is defended by a beast known as a 'Keilaises.' you may have noticed the statues within the cages, yes? Those are the statues of the Keilaises. They are large skeletal monsters made out of a mix of earth, stone, and magic. You will have to defeat the guardian Kelaise and then retrieve each shard that they protect. Once you have the shard, you will bring them to the pedestal. Once all of these shards have been collected, it is only then upon completion that we give you what you seek.
You have brought us the first shard. Sixteen more to go.
The shard glows white, spinning slowly as it hovers above the pedestal in the center of the table. Gradually the spinning becomes faster and faster, hovering higher and higher the faster it goes. Suddenly, it shifts directions instead of pointing down to the pedestal below it and aims towards your chest. The humming sound that you heard coming from the crystal becomes an unbearable screeching crescendo, the glowing white turned blinding and-
It streaked forwards in a flash of white, plunging through your chest, cutting through the sternum, through your heart-
It hurts it hurts, it hurts. oh god, it hurts so much-
A wordless cry escapes your mouth as the fire spreads through your chest and you stumble back, hands clawing at your chest as you choke. Ice spreading through your body as you stumble-
(Your first foe is...)
-You trip over your couch with a gasp, pinwheeling your arms as you fight to stay upright. It's a futile effort and you topple off the back with a yelp. Your bottom hits the floor first before your head does. Sending white-hot pain lancing up your spine. Your head thunks against the floor afterward, almost like an insult. The action sends staticky stars glitching through your vision as pain shoots through your skull.
You groan and decide to just lie there on the floor and wait for the pounding in your head, and the pain in your tailbone to subside.
Ten minutes later you are still lying there on the ground.
That was one of the weirdest dreams that I've had in awhile. You think tiredly as you stare up blankly at your ceiling. What was that place anyway?
You take a glance at the clock on the wall, red numbers- red red red like the rubies in the eye sockets of the two Keilaises - reading 5:45 in the morning. The sun hasn't even come up from behind the horizon yet, evident by the dark purple light barely visible through your blinds.
The sleepwalking I could do without though. Sighing, you sit up and rub the back of your head, wincing at the dull pang that results from the action.
You're so glad that you had the foresight to install thick carpeting around your house. Because without the plush carpet your brains would probably be mush by how many times you've fallen due to your sleepwalking escapades. You may need to schedule an appointment with your doctor because as of late your episodes have been becoming more and more frequent.
You honestly don't feel like going back to bed. You've got college in just a few hours, and you are too spooked from the dream to even try to go back to bed. Stretching slightly, you sigh as the bones in your spine crack satisfyingly. You decide to head off to the kitchen to make breakfast, wincing slightly when you realize that sitting down today is going to be very uncomfortable. Of course, you've done this song and dance before so it's not as bad as it could be.
You hum a tune from one of those songs that you hear on the radio on the way to school as your stir cream into the melted chocolate. The scent of hot cocoa fills your kitchen and you have to resist the urge to drool. Once it's all successfully mixed together you add some sugar and cinnamon, pouring the hot chocolate into your mug and topping it with whipped cream. Placing the pot into the sink, you grab your jacket and pull it over your shoulders. Reaching out you grab your mug and head out to your porch, the cold morning air caressing your face as you step outside.
Mount Ebbot looms in the distance. Despite all of the stories and rumors around the missing kids and the old stories that are found in the darkest corners of the library. You don't fear Mount Ebott. To you it's just another mountain, there have been countless other mountains such as Everest or the Rockies with their own missing people. Just because there are stories behind the mountain, doesn't mean that is scarier or creepy. So honestly, what is there to fear?
The mug is pleasantly warm in your hands as you gingerly sip your cocoa. The way the mountain looks suddenly reminds you of the Reinohr tower. Because you were so tiny in the shadows of its rooms. You idly rub at the spot on your chest from what the crystal stabbed through, an odd feeling bubbling up in your stomach. You take a sip and try to shake the memory out of your head. You'll probably forget all about it within the next few hours, dreams like those never last long in your head.
Something inside you whispers but what if it is was real?
You still remember the crippling pain that stole the breath from dream-you’s chest. That alien language the Reinohr spoke was too realistic to be created from only your mind. You weren't a linguist.
You decide to focus on the horizon, watching as the dark black gives way to purple's and pink, before igniting into oranges and yellows as the sun reaches higher and higher. By the time the sun pokes out of the horizon, your mug is empty. There's a distant sound of something breaking and shattering into a million shards and pieces. It sounds like glass.
You swear to whatever deity that is out there that you see a flash of light in the distance at the summit of Mt Ebott, and a humming comes deep from within your bones, deep in your sternum from where your heart lays. It spooks you enough that you quickly retreat to your house. Desperately pulling out ingredients to make breakfast and lunch before you drive to the Ebott City State University.
Did you hear? There were monsters spotted climbing down Mount Ebott.
I thought all those stories were just, you know, stories?
Guess they're true after all. Now, what do we do?
The world is ending!
This is the apocalypse starting to happen. The demons from Ebott are coming and within the next week they'll make their move and destroy us all!
They'll kill our women, destroy our homes. Take children from their mothers and corrupt their souls!
Only God can help us now.
The news said that monsters have come down from Mt. Ebott. Crazy don'cha think DJ Mason?
Yeah Rob, I even heard that those creatures were being led by some children. Children! Can you believe it, Rob?
I agree with ya Mason. How bad must those parents be to abandon a child at Mount Ebott and leave them at the mercy of monsters! Didn't those idiots hear about the stories?
The monsters don't seem to want to hurt us though, did you see the Queen? Toriel right? She was nothing but kind and serene...
Oh, come on, Dee-jay. These monsters are probably like those crazy Russians, waiting for the right time to strike. You can't trust them!
They're going to kill us, Clara! I say that the military should blow them all away and keep them off of our streets.
I bet they're very nice. You saw the queen, she practically acts like my mom, hell, she's even like your mom! I say we wait and see what they do before we judge them.
You're just being stupid, Clara.
I'm an optimist Rachel, you know that.
Still, they're called monsters for a reason.
Monsters descending from Mount Ebott.
That's all you've been hearing about since you've arrived at college. The first from the radio as you traversed through the streets. From the gossip about your classmates. It seems to be the thing that everyone's talking about, even your teachers seem distracted in their own way.
Yes, you are distracted in your own right, but it's not from the shock about finding out that monsters actually exist. But as far as you're concerned, you just want this day to be over. Done with. You want to spend the rest of it zoning out on dumb fail compilation videos and other vids featuring cute kittens.
You still haven't forgotten your dream and it's been hours now. Every time your pen touches the surface of your sketchbook you can't help but doodle the things you saw In your dreams. You draw countless runes that you saw crawling up the walls. Or you sketch the alabaster skulls of the red-eyed ones, using a red pen to color in those ruby gems.
It's not real. It's just a dream. You repeat over and over as you work on your animation project. It's just a dumb dream, you're just overthinking it Y/N. Get a grip.
Grip was not gotten.
By the time you got to your graphics design class. You ended up doodling three whole rows of intricate symbols that you had seen on the walls. The shard that shot through your chest several times in different angles. But the one you've been working on for the longest is one of the red-eyed ones. The one with the golden canine tooth trapped in its cage. Its mouth is open up in a snarl, face pressed up against the bars but unable to bite through due to the muzzle covering the bottom half of its face. The muzzle with the bars and the odd spikes that jut out from the front looks almost like a medieval torture device. Its expression is desperately angry, saliva leaking from its mouth and its paws scratching at the bars but unable to escape. You shade in the bones, highlight the shine in its gemstone eyes and color the saliva a faint reddish pink.
You look at the finished product with a pained expression because of how sad and hurt it looks. Like it's trying to desperately escape its prison but can't due to the collar tightly latched around its neck. The chains wrapped around its bones and legs pulling it back from the bars. It looks like it's trying to reach something. You think back to the sharp-scary Keilaise on the opposite side. Maybe it's trying to help out it other. Their sibling? Their brother or sister? Maybe.
Your thoughts flicker back to the question you had confusedly asked in the dream.
Did they deserve to be locked up?
The answer, for now, is no. No, they don't.
You close your sketchbook with a snap, something inside you ends up feeling oddly hollow. Saving your graphic design for some fictional company, you turn it into your teacher and make your way through the ECSU halls. Your head has a fuzzy haziness to it, and you distractedly dodge your fellow students as you make your way back to the parking lot. Somehow you don't manage to collide with anyone. Guess your spatial awareness works after all.
Distantly you can hear students still buzzing about the monsters, but you pay them no mind.
You reach your car in less than five minutes. Your car is a 23XX Model BMW, painted in white that your parents had bought you for your sixteenth birthday. BMW's aren't as expensive as they were a few hundred years ago. Tickets to Mars cost way more than any car nowadays. You've had it for a long time now, and have made sure to take good care of it.
Your mother was a wealthy lawyer who has won many of her cases. She's ruthless and very stuck in her ways, so much so that more often than not a simple conversation would quickly morph into a blowout argument that left you both feeling bitter. It wasn't that you hated your mother, you really did love her. But you couldn't stand her half of the time. Your father works for some big company as a programming engineer. Compared to your mother, your father is very kind and caring. You know that old saying, opposite attracts? Your parents are living proof of that saying. He loves you so much and has always supported you in all of your endeavors. He was everything that you wished your Mom could be.
You also have a sibling. They could be annoying at times which was very often. You would get into the typical sibling arguments that most families have when there are children, but you still care about them. You'd comfort them in the aftermath of your mother's tirade when they were left in tears. Because Mom would never comfort them when she said words that cut deeper than any knife. And when she did the same to you, in the wake of that long continuous argument. They would find you and they would comfort you the same way as you had done for them. But since you've moved out of the house to Ebott City, you haven't seen or talked to them in months.
You hope that they're doing okay. You hope that your Mom has left them alone. Maybe you'll call them later.
Opening the door to your car, you haphazardly place your school stuff into the passenger side seat. Slamming the driver's side door after you get in an buckle your seatbelt. As you glance over at your things on the side seat, you notice that in your carelessness. Your sketchbook had come out of the satchel, flopping open and revealing the red-eyed Keilaise. You lock eyes with it's drawn on ones, and it stares back at you with pleading eyes. A lump forms in your throat and you take a moment to rest your head against the steering wheel. You don't care if you look strange for crying in your car.
It's just a dream. You think to yourself defeatedly, your breathing coming our shaky. You wonder if you're about to cry.
But what if it's not?