Naked

[Tearen Wover]

The first time Tearen had come to the void, he hadn't really paused to take in the atmosphere and climate of the place. Though the trackless hallways of striped obsidian were not necessarily off-putting to the eldritch human, he did now realize that the Void was actually apparently devoid of temperature. Even though he had just used a considerable amount of Omnilium to shunt his essence here directly from a steaming jungle, the darkened world felt neither cool nor warm. It provided an uncanny sense of limbo – that anything could exist here indefinitely. Neither hunger nor thirst would kill a traveler within the Void; only trackless ages and a withering mind.

This was, of course, just a poetic assumption on his part. Still, it left him feeling restless and eager to proceed onto his final destination. Tearen stared down at his own hands, half covered by his ceremonial robes of the Enigma and sighed. He was closer here to his natural state than anywhere else, and now that he had finally departed the Omniverse proper, he no longer felt beholden to its mortal mores. The elder Prime shed his cloak and other clothes, one article at a time, until he walked bare-skinned along the smooth, glassy floor. As expected, it felt no cooler, having peeled his trappings away, but that still wouldn't have changed his mind. He had taken on so much baggage during his travels across Omni's playground that he had barely had time to meditate or take stock of himself. Holding on to these worldly bindings would only hinder his resolve, and besides, to stand before the pinnacle deity of a given reality was to expose one's self in many ways.

The symbolic nature of traveling in the buff lost its novelty after what Tearen presumed to be a few hours of trackless wandering. Based on what he knew about the Void, the placement of various dimensional Gates was arbitrary. Any number of the whirling vortices he had already walked passed may well have conveyed him directly into the fabled Oververse, but this was time that the Shadow wished to see through in its full...though, some company may have been nice. As tempting as it might have been to drag one or more of his disciples into this world of inbetweens, having another Prime along on this venture would defeat one of its most important aspects; that none could know of what would come to pass. There was only one person he trusted in this matter, for she had been a part of him for the better part of two months now. It was strange, thinking back on it, that his daring escape from the Underverse had been so very recent, but the Omniverse had a tendency to drag its temporal feet in that regard.

Finding a secluded place to summon, Tearen sat down on his bare haunches and allowed streams of Omnilium to flow from his very pores, out into the obsidian blackness. The prismatic power cast rainbow scintillation across the honed angles of the looming, senseless architecture. The storm of light illuminated the angles of that particular patch of Void for almost two hours; the longest and most meticulous summoning that Tearen had ever performed. No less could be accepted, for the subject of the conjuration deserved nothing less than perfection...

[Tearen Wover]

Tearen focused on the shape and memory of Myla's body as it was stored in his mind. Her form was more than a memory; having absorbed her physical and mental essence in the form of Omnilium, the eldritch human had an almost literal blueprint of her every aspect in his mind. Certainly, Tearen had conjured and summoned secondary human bodies in the past, but these had always been little more than tools. He could not say for sure whether or not Drake Oneir had been created with utmost accuracy the few times that Nealaphh had re summoned the highly danger-prone smuggler, but neither had Nealaphh cared for Drake in the same manner that Tearen now cared for Myla.

He started with her fundamental necessities. Brain, lymbic system, nerves, and circulation. He carefully traced each winding pathway with his mind's eye, allowing the Omnilium to sustain the haggard network as he gradually added layers of sinew, muscle and fat. Organs ballooned and fell into place within her body cavity, which knitted itself closed once the proper bones were set. Her skinless form now hung in the shadowed glass grotto, gently cocooned by an amniotic sac of the miracle substance. Tearen, with his eyes shut and brow furrowed, tilted his head slightly. Would it be honorable to make a few discreet adjustments to her default form? After all, there were things that Myla had expressed disappointment about, regarding her body, that he could edit now. Doing it later would be painful and far more inaccurate. He breathed deep, and sighed. Might as well.

A few minor adjustments to her genome and physical attributes, and it was done. Now he was able to focus on the features of Myla herself. It started with her chin, supple, yet tapering to a sharp point. It traced back around her head in a demure jawline which held a hint of noble bearing in its height. Full, cheeks, bisected by her glossy lips that held an innate smile even within the torpor of summoning. Her porcelain skin crawled smoothly over the raw facial muscles, cartilage pushing her upturned button nose into place. The bridge of her nose curved and branched out into her stalwart brow that portrayed the severity of a life of hardship. A tall forehead emerged as skin finished tracing along her skull, and a curtain of auburn hair shamelessly cascaded forth from the previously bare scalp, that curled at the ends into shimmering columns.

Tearen turned his attention to her shoulders, broad and firm, tempered by decades of hard labor and sexual alacrity. Minute hairs glistened outwards from the backs of her delicate forearms, and her pianist's fingers flexed subconsciously as their tendons snapped into position. Fat and essential glands swelled forth from her chest, forming ample breasts, though not so large as to be cumbersome. Twin blemishes flared upon them, turning into pink and soft nipples. The light from the swirling Omnilium traced a shadow along her torso as a sensual midline was creased into her abdomen, terminating in a slightly elongated belly button. The sweeping curves that descended from shoulder to hip solidified into her luscious profile, and the ridge of her spine faded at the point where two dimples announced the start of her buttocks. Light spilled across these fleshy hillocks, as divots ran between her legs to form genitals, consecrating the symmetrical beauty that was to be called 'woman'. Long legs of firm strength stretched and flexed as her feet twisted into life, each nubby toe running through the full gamut of its motion before Myla's entire body curled up on itself once more.

Tearen ran his attention over her body once more, paying special attention to any potential flaws and correcting them, before shaping a simple shawl to wrap the Underverse refugee's sculpted form in. Then, in the manner of a fleeting wind, the Elder Prime breathed her mind back into her body slowly and carefully. No bias nor misconception was allowed to contaminate the raw information that he had originally absorbed from her dying, original body. A philosopher may have asked if this, then, was truly Myla. Tearen may have responded with the inquiry of whether it truly mattered.

Satisfied that his work was done, Tearen relaxed his attention and stemmed the tide of Omnilium that had been flooding from his physical form. Flittering embers of the colorful medium sparked around Myla like a host of fireflies as she slowly pushed herself off of the smooth floor. Her orange eyes blinked softly in the unnatural light of The Void, and she focused on the human form in front of her.

"Wh...who...where..." she said, her hoarse vocal chords straining for the first time ever.

"It's okay Myla. It's me, Tearen. As for where...well, we're technically nowhere." the Shadow said, standing up. He wiped a cold veil of sweat away from his face and fluffed his long, platinum white hair away from his back, where it had been clinging. Myla looked around, as if she was waking up from a long sleep, and ponderously ran a hand along her arm.

"I died. You...resummoned me. So this isn't the Underverse?" Myla said, as memories fought their way through the thick miasma of her newly fomented mind. Tearen nodded solemnly and stretched his limbs. He had decided to stop paying attention to exact time for the duration of his stay within the Void, but he was certain that he has been summoning for at least four hours. He hear a rustling as Myla stood up, strong and unshaking. She patted the surface of one of the black, featureless columns that stretched its way upwards, into infinity. She walked slowly, tracing a hand along its surface until she bumped into someone directly in front of her. She yelped slightly, but heard Tearen laugh.

"No, no Myla it's okay. This is not the Underverse. This is the Void, the world between worlds." he murmured as he helped the woman to her feet. Myla stood up and ten blinked again, as if truly seeing Tearen for the first time. She squinted, looking him up and down, and raised an honest eyebrow. She reached up with an unabashed hand and touched the features on the Shadow's stern face, running a delicate thumb across his lips.

"You're...a man now. Is this like a Prime thing?" she asked, finally adding a characteristic note of playfulness to her voice. Tearen smiled widely and laughed in spite of himself.

"Yeah, pretty much."

Myla smiled sweetly, and hugged the ex-enigma close, kissing him sweetly on the shoulder.

"Thank you." she whispered.

With that, Tearen took her gently by the hand and led her away from the shadowed grotto, in the manner that a mother bear takes a cub from the den for the first time. This was not the Underverse, but the Void was perilous in and of itself. He would not let Myla go until it was time for him to depart the Omniverse altogether...

[Tearen Wover]

Tearen and Myla walked for hours, lost in conversation. The succubus had also removed the clothing that Tearen had so politely crafted for her, saying that it was 'only fair'. Tearen wasn't entirely sure if this was some sort of ploy to goad him into rutting with her, but decided just to accept it. He certainly could have read her mind, but the Elder Prime was weary of such things by this point. With every step he took, he simply wanted to finish his final task in the Omniverse and return to a human state. It was curious that the sort of telepathy, telekinesis and other fantastic powers he had just bestowed upon the new Enigmas would be things he chose to shun afterwards. He and Myla discussed this at length, and when it came down to it, they came to a simple conclusion: perhaps in his old world, these powers would not have inhibited his connection to his peers. But to be a Prime was to be a very special kind of lonely.

By definition, Primes existed to be pitted against one another. Certainly, they could form alliances and groups and find friends among one another. On the whole, however, theirs was a destiny of eternal conflict and strife. If a Prime wasn't on their way to right or amend some great, Omniversal wrong, it was entirely likely that they were the ones causing the problem. Primes constantly existed with the onus of being the forces of change in the Omniverse, and it was a role that secondaries seemed all too content with.

Myla posited, as a secondary, that it wasn't so much that they were content with Prime rule, but that they didn't want to risk angering any particular Prime. Myla knew all too well that maxim which Tearen had called upon for so long; Never falter in the face of infinity. The mere fact that Primes could try and fail at a task an unlimited number of times meant that they would inevitably overcome anything in their way. Even a nation of secondaries, mortal, could not possibly stand against a single determined Prime, given enough time and determination.

"We just...prefer to accept the inevitable, and let Primes dictate the Omniverse. Besides, you know all too well that not even the Underverse can hold a Prime forever." she said with a slight huff. Indeed, during his time in this divided world, Tearen had become acutely aware of the seething resentment that secondaries held for their lords and creators. At first he had planned on utilizing it to inspire a momentum towards overthrowing Omni himself. Now that he had finished wreaking his personal havoc on the Verses, Tearen felt he would prefer just to be a part of mortal kind again. 

"One of the core principals I hold is that people exist only through their effect on the people around them." Tearen said, walking up a flight of steps that had a white stripe running up their center. The pair of void walkers had been following this particular leyline almost since setting out, and it had led them out of the choking halls of glassy nonsense into a stark, wide-open plain. Two figures, hand in hand, walking along a black mirror that held no reflection. Tearen had been attempting to find some poetic significance to it, but arrived at the conclusion that the only thing it illustrated was how far removed they were from normality...as much as that term could be applied to the proper Omniverse. Thankfully, the Shadow was comfortable enough with non-euclidian space that he knew the secret to its navigation: patience. Speed nor direction nor orientation mattered in such a place: only intent and willpower. It was why cities such as the famous R'lyeh had been such a perfect snare for unwitting humans, for it was not the feet but the mind that carried you where you wished to be. He was shaken from his introspection when Myla finally responded.

"So...if a tree falls in the wood kind of mentality?" she asked, looking up at him with her orange, glittering eyes. Looking into them, Tearen noted that they were not dilated to compensate for the suffocating darkness around him. It had to be presumed that not even light followed a straight path within The Void.

"Perhaps, but it is a matter all the more profound. Consider...a person can be alone, but not feel lonely. Likewise, they can be surrounded by people, and feel very lonely indeed. Follow?" Tearen offered. He realized he had been staring into her eyes for too long, and the leyline they had been walking directly on top of was now gone. He breathed deep, chose a direction, and started off in it. Holding Myla's hand was not a mere sign of affection; it was to ensure that this perfidious, bent dimension would not pull them apart.

"Yeah, I know that feeling pretty well. Can't think of how many times I was shrieking for someone riding me and just felt...isolated at the same time." Myla said softly. Tearen did not detect any self-pity in her voice, but there was an honest melancholy. Tearen switched the hand he was using to hold hers and put an arm around her shoulder.

"Mhm. Well...in my practice we are able to open ourselves to the greater fellowship that we are part of. Not just Enigmas, but all of mortal kind. Billions of lives that we can choose to feel are with us, that we are a part of. In that same vein, we can seek compassion and understanding even for our enemies. In the Omniverse it is...more difficult. Primes are mighty, but in exchange, we are a group of souls that are going nowhere, very fast." Tearen said, realizing the poignancy of his statement as he looked around at their bare environs. Myla scoffed.

"Even your enemies huh? What about Diablo?" Myla asked, spitting at the mere mention of his name.

"Diablo...intrigues me. I never met him personally, so I am hesitant to make a conclusive opinion, but...he looked at me. I'm sure of it." Tearen said, quickly recounting his tale from the colosseum city of Azgradurg, and the feeling he had of the oppressive gaze. Myla looked at him in concern, for the pain on his face was evident, and the elder Prime even scratched at the demonic brands on his back.

"He is evil...there is no doubt of that. But he seems to pursue it for its own sake...or...at least that's what he projects. He is a danger to the Omniverse, and must be removed, but I do have compassion for him at least in wondering how he came to exist in such a manner. I have walked among Gods, and all of them-"

Tearen was cut off as a sudden, blinding flash cruised overhead. A single, feathered streak of light, moving too quickly for the eye to fully register, traced a jagged line from one end of the horizon to the other. The sound of a distant sonic boom followed a moment later.

"Was that..." Myla stuttered, now clutching Tearen's hand in a frightened, iron grip. Tearen was quiet for a moment.

"An angel. I'm sure of it." the Shadow confirmed.

"Should we...follow it?" the succubus continued. Her emotions were a seething mix of awe, glee and terror. It wasn't Tearen's choice to feel them empathically, but the outflow of emotion from the secondary was so intense that it threatened to infect his own stalwart serenity. He remained calm, for the most part, but a note of anticipation crept into his speech.

"No sense in following directly, but...we are close..."