[center][hr][hr][h1][b][i][color=F5DEB3]Tartarean Strands: Chapter 1[/color][/i][/b][/h1][hr][b][i][color=F5DEB3]Date:[/color][/i][/b] D-Day of the Collide[hr][youtube]https://youtu.be/je3w9o7SJZ4[/youtube][/center][hr]
	It wasn't supposed to be like this. Or was it? Could anything be truly stopped once it began? They say everything we do it a beginning, a catalyst that sets off a chain reaction of events. We never know exactly what will happen but when we look back we can find that one moment that started everything. I suppose that is true. There was a moment, long before any of you were born, that was the pebble dropped in the pond of time. It rippled out towards the shores but instead of washing easily on the sands, losing its momentum, and rolling back into the waters it grew in strength. Like a tsunami that crashed out of control and took out everything in its path. The threads of time holding everything in place not simply cut but utterly destroyed and it causing a catastrophic domino effect where everything fell into itself. Where all life both existed and was nonexistent. Careful where you step, because you could suddenly be replaced by another. Are you living? Are you dead? I don't know. All I know is that everything is colliding and we are somewhere within the In-Between. How did we get here? Let's look. 

[center][hr][img]https://i.gifer.com/DQrx.gif[/img][hr][b][color=998849]New York, New York, USA: November 5th, 1943[/color][/b][hr][/center]
	In a small one room apartment above Club Afterdark, Parliament lay unmoving on his bed. Faith had asked her questions and if he could have nodded or given her a look of understanding he would have. Thing was, a man in his condition couldn't move anymore. Yet he could move things. The voices that seemed to come from the writhing intestines silenced and Siduri looked towards the man. Her brows furrowing. [color=D8BFD8]"I never meant for her to go,"[/color] she finally said after a long silence. Her voice was stern and cold as ice. 

	[i]"We all are but she may be the only one that can get to her."[/i] It was Parliaments voice but not from the open cavity of his body, it came to Faiths mind. [i]"I do not have much time, so listen carefully. The timelines are collapsing. We do not know when it began or how. We just know it is happening. This is the last semi-stable one. Our only hope for you to get her is to go before it collapses here fully, or you could end up stranded, in the middle, somewhere. This was not the plan. Siduri hoped to stop her from leaving, and then hoped to get you here soon enough to help us contact her. All we have now is for you to go to her."[/i] His voice rang clear in Faiths mind and Siduri held this look sweeping across her features that she was anything but happy. 

	[i]"Forgive me child,"[/i] Parliament said before Faith would feel something akin to an increased weight go through her veins. It wasn't painful but it was disturbing. Like she was being controlled, like puppet. Siduri's eyes widened and she rushed forward, her pink eyes flashing but she was held in place and lifted off the ground by an unseen force. [i]"Either help me or where she lands I have no control over."[/i] It wasn't supposed to be like this. It was supposed to be a talk, a training session, but it seemed the dice had been tossed and there were two choices. To roll with it or fight against it. One left one in the unknown, the other left one dead. Better to survive to fight another day. 

	Siduri nodded. The grasp of whatever held her releasing her. For a woman that gave little expression she showed one today. Confusion and understanding, anger and pity. It mixed together in a haze as she slowly stepped towards Faith. [color=D8BFD8]"We just have to have Faith..."[/color] It was an odd thing to say. Did she mean faith in general? Or was Faith herself what they needed? It was not something one was left to ponder as Siduri placed her hands on either side of Faiths temples. Somehow, Faith's body began to shift. Going glassy but it didn't stop there. It faded into the floor, into the walls, into everything without a consciousness around her. Vision for Faith will go from Haze to as if she is looking through a kaleidoscope. There is a single ray of light focused to one side, almost steel gray among the rainbow of bright colors. Faith feels pulled in that direction.  

[center][hr][img]http://giphygifs.s3.amazonaws.com/media/CY09K6UKVelq0/giphy.gif[/img][hr][b][color=F5DEB3]Somewhere in the In-Between[/color][/b][hr][/center]
	How long had it been? Far longer than she would like to admit, not long enough to find answers. Only enough time to survive. Perhaps. Time was relative, no place more so than here. It was as if time had stood still since the dawn of time itself and yet moved forward far beyond anything she could remember seeing. What was day or night? The sun rose and it set. But it wasn't the sun she knew. It wasn't the moon she watched turn phases to mark each month. Sulfur, always the smell of sulfur in the air. Was this hell? Perhaps, by someone's definition. Perhaps even by her own centuries before but it wasn't what she would deem as hell now. Nor was it heaven. All she could call it was the In-Between. Perhaps there was a better name for it but it didn't matter. She hadn't spoken to nor even seen someone in what felt like a life time. Save herself. Sometimes all you had was yourself. 

	It had begun simple enough. A pull. A familiar pull. She had to see. She couldn't mix them up in this. Had she known, perhaps she would have asked one along. Then again, why would she wish them here? She wouldn't. There were few she would wish in this place. The dust kicked up around her, winding through the strips of leather that brushed her boots. Then, there was a pull. Her eyes, like worn gunmetal in hues of blue and green snapped to one side as her head jerked. [color=0072bc]"No..."[/color] A whispered plea but she knew she wasn't mistaken. From the mouth of the cave where she stood, she began to run. Fists pumping as feet found ground. Remember the traps, avoid them. Keep running. To the waters edge. 

	Never go into the deep waters. Things below the surface will try to drag you down with them. Things lost. Things that need to remain lost. Yet she knew something was below the surface that shouldn't be lost. Feet in the water up to her ankles she stopped and looked around. She could feel it, but where? The waters muddled everything. Focus, pay attention. Something is different. It feels different. There it was. It looked like glass. Like a reflection looking back of her, or perhaps it was only on the other side. Reaching down, she couldn't get passed it. Her hand stopping. Beating on the glass, it refused to break. If she went around it, it spread. Something was holding the face, holding it there, keeping it below the surface. [color=0072bc]"You can't have her,"[/color] she grunted as she drew a sword from her hip and brought it down. The glass shattering. Her other hand came down, wrapping under a waist. Hands clawing, trying to grab the girl and drag her back down below the surface. 

	[color=0072bc]"Faith! Wake up and fight!"[/color] Evelina yelled as she swung her sword again, it cutting through the water and hands pulling back from Faiths body only to try to grab her again.