AS.9

Aegis mindsea.

The moment her eyes opened, she understood that there was something wrong; it was the lack of rhythmic heartbeat in her brother's chest, the missing aroma that made her feel so contended, or just the fact that rather than her brother's room, she was found staring at the vast expanse of darkness full of blinking lights.

"Awake, are we?" Her eyes moved to the sound; even young as she was, she understood that she should feel scared, anxious about the unfamiliarity of it all, but all she felt was...

A sense of familiarity?

Weiss's eyes finally found the source of that voice, her breath hitching as she stared at the giant of a man in bulky golden armor with strange but familiar engravings she once saw in her big brother's scattered screeches.

"Who are you? Where are we? Where is my big brother." The more she spoke, the less heated she was, but the question about her big brother Wherebous was uttered in an emotionless voice that made the giant chuckle.

"Truly, you are a precious little thing, arent you? You don't need to worry, after all..." The man looked from her to something behind her.

When she curiously looked too, as she felt no sense of danger from him, her breath stopped at the amount of...

Lights in the wast distance.

"After all... We are inside of your big brother's mind." His words didn't register in her head for a while until her eyes widened at what she had heard.

"But deep down, you already knew that, didn't you? After all, you are too open, too carefree, something impossible if not for being close to him, arent you? He is the reason why you can even feel safe, so it brings reason for you to be so at ease; after all, where is the safest place for you than in the mind of the person you love most?" The man easily said.

"You... You didn't answer my first question, who are you? And if what you say is true, then why are you in big brother's head? Why im there too?"

Once her words flew from her mouth, Weiss uneasily shifted as she felt, felt as if an untold amount of gazes flickered toward her.

But with just one lift of hand, Weiss could feel those gazes shift away in fear.

"Hmm, in truth, my name is meaningless to you; im just a remnant of failed age from the failed universe... But if you want to call me by something, then Emperor would be my most used moniker." The man smiled, but Weiss, Weiss's heart stopped as her eyes widened, the gaze.

It was the same gaze her big brother always had; it was the same gaze she saw on him once he wasn't looking at her or others in their small family.

"But to answer another question of yours, you know this is real; after all, you can hear them, don't you? You could hear the whispers around your big brother from a young age. Could you? You could see the mist of faces float around his head when he wasn't concentrating on reigning them in, couldn't you? You know this is as real as anything around Aegis."

"Why, why, how im there?" Weiss didn't know what to say, everything the man said was true; Weiss didn't reject the fact, she had never said that she could hear voices when near big brother, from a young age she knew it wasn't normal, and so she stayed quiet, later she learned to ignore these whispers, sometimes she used them for her sake as they were helpful, and sometimes her eyes scrunched in disgust when she felt something disgusting.

"Why, yes, why? Look at these lights. Can you guess how many are there? These small lights that blink in and out of existence?" Weiss didn't know why he wanted this from her, but she understood that the man had certain agenda behind this intent, so she followed up with his request, as she had no other choice.

That, and anything that helped her to get closer to big brother, was useful.

But once her blue eyes narrowed at the sigh of the sea of lights, she shook her head.

"It's impossible; the mere number of them is... Staggering."

"It is, isn't it? Do you want to know something interesting? These whispers you could always hear, why don't you sharpen your ears and don't listen now instead of just watching?" Her eyes opened wide at Emperor's words as she realized she had ignored one simple fact: that she now could hear these whispers that plagued her for years, but now so more clear.

So clear, so clear, so clear and loud, SO LOUD?! SO LOUD! LOUD!!

"Enough." Another word was uttered, and Weiss found herself looking at the man who again lifted his hand, just as she could found herself curled on the ground, with her head between her hands as she desperately tried to hold her ears.

"Im sorry little one, it seems that you aren't as accustomed to this as I previously thought... Hmmm." The man seemed to be in thought, Weiss used that moment to gather herself, yet her head still felt as if thousands of nails pierced her head.

"But time is not our friend in there, so we must get to the crux of the problem, even if it had to hurt you little." The giant turned around, making Weiss blink, she still felt a little disoriented, but ever so slowly, the pain substituted.

"Tell me, do you know what your eyes ever witnessed? These voices, I, and everything around there, do you understand what we are?" Weiss straightened up as she looked at Emperor.

"Minds, no, you are souls; I read something about it, and even if fiction, I think it's the most assured assessment." The man's smile widened as he nodded at Weiss.

"Yes, we are souls, little one; we are but remnants of failed dreams and goals, remnants of something bigger, greater... But that still doesn't answer your unvoiced question, does it? You wish to know why we are in your big brother's head, don't you?"

"Yes." One simple word, but with so much meaning, Weiss looked resolutely; she wanted, no, needed to know why her big brother was so tormented; she heard but a whisper, but Weiss knew, she knew, that her big brother didn't hear just small whispers, not after experiencing their voices in there, so many loud voices.

Why, just why, was her brother so tortured? Weiss needed to know, so she could help him.

"Hmm, I would have you look at one last thing... To your side, what do you see." Weiss turned around, even if she knew it would bring her pain, yet no pain came, at least not yet, as she observed what looked to be...

An enormous door?

"Doors? Engraved ones at that..." But once she spoke, she noticed her words weren't quite right.

Those weren't engravings...

Weiss's eyes scrunched up as she tried to discern something, not noticing Emperor watching her with no small amount of interest and approval.

"Yes... Yes, young one, those aren't intentional lines; those are..."

"Damage, scars... But why, and what are those doors? Why are there in my big brother's mind?" Weiss sharply asked as she looked at Emperor, yet deep inside her, something moved; something wasn't quite right, and Weiss's uneasiness grew with each second.

The giant of man looked at those doors, his eyes distant, as if he was lost in his thoughts, and yet his mouth moved.

"An interesting phenomenon... As I already said, we are but souls, remnants of something once whole, tormented by our inability to find peace even in the embrace of death; our torment was our own, for it was our unfulfilled dreams, desires, and goals that tormented us so much..."

With each word, Weiss's understanding grew, but rather than answers, she gained more questions.

"Those doors... You can say that those doors are our salvation... Or doom."

"What. Are. They." Weiss felt the need to press for more, she felt that time was running off, and yet she gained almost nothing.

"As I said, our salvation, or doom to some, for those doors inside of your big brother, leads to no other place than the resting place for failed remnants like myself." Weiss's looks conveyed understanding and dread as she put together what the man said.

"Yes, the same place from which your big brother came, a place he shall not ever forget, for he will forever hold a close connection to it, but the same doors you see... Tell me, what do you think will happen if a man such as Aegis adheres to control of himself to the highest degree... Lose control of himself?"

Weiss's face paled little by little as her breath quickened; her frantic look at the doors searched for any deceit and falsehood as she slowly understood.

"Yes, the doors which your brother holds closed, regulated for the simple reason as not to lose 'himself,' holding on any pieces of sanity left in him... Even with these doors, it is never ending fight for him, the whispers, ideas, and dreams not his own, the foreign and different morals, all of it..."

Emperor sighs.

"All of it, almost gone because of your stunt, little lady; you almost lost the person you love the most, all because of your desire to help him."

"No... No, no, no, no, no!" Weiss's hands reached for her shaking head, but as despair was about to devour her whole, another voice ejected her from the darkness.

"That is enough."

---///---

Aegis Mindsea after Weiss's ejection.

"Your audacity knows no bounds, o failed one." An ethereal but almost emotionless voice sounded in the void as the golden's man head turned to the side.

"If you disagree with my approach, maybe you should speak with the child yourself; after all, she is the sister of your student... Miss Scathach."

Purple eyes bored into the giant of a man who found himself wanting.

"It is no place to meddle into 'his' affairs." Emperor scoffed.

"Please, we all know that those words hold no meaning; it was you who barred these doors from being completely destroyed in that little incident; non-interference ended up by your own hand... Not that we disagree, if not you, one of us would hold these doors; Aegis is, after all, the hope we waited on for so long."

Emperor touched his neck as he rubbed it, a ghost feeling of spear pressing on it quickly disappearing, but he knew that he almost pushed one of the Warden's buttons; Scatchach wasn't known to be sentimental, but there were few things even the oldest and most powerful souls in Shadow realm stayed their hand from and one of them was to push these few buttons the Warden of Shadow realm had.

And he almost pressed it; even if he couldn't die, no soul in Shadow Realm could, as it was their punishment to live forever without the capability of influencing the real world, the Warden still could make their stay much more uncomfortable.

The purple eyes shone with untold power.

"Do not overstay your hands... And these words are for everyone who hears this." She disappeared just as quickly as she arrived.

"Yep... She is still a pain in the ass..." Still, looking back into the material world through Aegis' eyes, Emperor hummed.

The souls lost in Shadow Realm couldn't influence the material world...

At least until the enigma, the anathema of the old order, came into existence...

Aegis Schnee...

The boy whose existence denied multiple orders and laws of universes, the boy on whose Emperor's dreams rested...

He was just one of the Emperor of Mankind avatars; he knew there were more of 'him' in other alternate universes; he was just one of the failed ones.

He chose differently, as when he was about to put onto that blasted golden chair, he chose to go with a bang and take as many daemons and gods with him; in a way, he succeeded as his last move gave humanity breathing room from that chaos leeches...

But he saw what they became without him there to lead them; he watched how his once proud imperium was divided in infighting as the old human instincts and greed took possession of them without him being there to reign them...

"I truly hope you will end up differently..." Emperor lost hope for his own imperium, yet he still hoped that one day, one day Aegis would meet another incarnation of the Emperor; at least in some way, his dream would come true.

Emperor looked back from the material world as he was about to witness Aegis calm down the distraught Weiss, seeing the multiple radiant stars.

After all, there were more of them in there, leaders, gods in their own way, whose dreams of redemption and second chance rested on Aegi's shoulder...

All watching, all waiting...

The Warden will have a hard job of holding them all back...

---///---

Schnee mansion

82 AFGR

Aegis POV:

He held the head of his crying sister as he quietly hummed into her ears.

He was unaware of the reason for Weiss to cry, as it came so suddenly, but he held her close to himself.

Well, that was a partial lie; Aegis could guess what happened; even when he dreamed, he could hear whispers back in his mind, whispers that were surprisingly quiet this night, the very same night when Weiss awakened with tears already in her eyes.

Yet, he felt no fear or uneasiness, even if he guessed that Weiss knew the truth of his origin.

"Do you wish to speak of it?" After a while, Aegis finally asked as he felt Weiss become calmer, yet she shook her head, her face still buried in his chest.

"...Im still your brother. Nothing changed that fact." This time, Weiss finally lifted up her face, her face puffy pink from all the crying, as her moist eyes met his.

"I-it not that..."

"Hm..." In the end, Aegis chose not to press; he could hear sincerity in Weiss's voice; even knowing the truth, she still saw him in the same way, and that was all Aegis needed to know.

Yet he wondered what Weiss saw deep inside his mind, for he himself rarely, if ever, gone there, for with each visit, he lost a little part of himself, and with each prolonged second in there, he risked losing everything, as he could lose himself in a sea of souls memories.

It was the same reason why he rarely ever sought any powerful knowledge that was hidden deeper in him, even if ripe for taking, everything had its price, and Aegi's ego of self was the price for such knowledge.

---///---

The Camp

82 AFGR

Eve POV:

She looked at her brooding brother, giggling as he swatted away another pair of hands; he was never a social one; no, that was Eve's strength, wasn't it?

She could still hardly believe her luck, of the luck of everyone in there, there in the verdant valley, that had natural protections against any large party of Grimm, full of vibrant nature, with clear spring water and plenty of food.

This was their home, their new home.

THEIR HOME.

"Iron family?" Eve looked away with a blush on her cheeks as Adam's unimpressive voice sounded beside her.

"H-hey! It's not that bad..." She weakly defended it. Yes, she mayhaps recommended this name, but she really didn't think it would garner such popularity...

And so quickly at that...

"...I suppose it's not the worst name... From you." Eve's face brightened, just for her eyes to narrow at the last mumbling words.

"Oh, and what is that supposed to mean?" Her voice was sweetly innocent, making Adam flinch, but his face quickly morphed into worry as he saw her touch her belly...

Crap basket... She wanted to hide this from him.

"Your injury!... It's still not healed; you should stay in bed."

"No! Not even for one freaking minute! Im sick of not being able to go out, and... I want, I want to be part of this, Adam! You went and joined Bloody Snowflake, but I have the right to make my own choices!"

She was thankful, and she truly was, for what BS did had for them; if they freed them even a week later, she knew it would be too late for her, and she feared, truly did about what that would make her brother into, she was Adam's last anchor, without her...

Adam always had problems with his anger; sometimes, it led him to regrettable actions, not being able to hold himself if pushed too far; what would become of him without her to hold him back?

She shuddered at that thought.

"I... No, you are right... Just..."

"Don't worry; this Eve Taurus is strong enough to take care of herself! Plus, there are more of us with the same experience who could help me!" She smiled at Adam; her brother was worrywart.

Still, she apologized to Adam in her thoughts; she wasn't truthful to him; nobody in the Camp was truly truthful to those who joined BS; it wasn't because they detested or feared them.

No, they feared for them, as they were just like all others who BS saved, but some secrets were needed.

Like the open secret in the Camp, the one that could damage those who joined BS in search of change or simple vengeance on SDC...

And that secret was none other than their savior, the one who led BS, and Camp was nobody other than Aegis Schnee...

Niveus is Aegis Schnee and the secret they held from their brothers and sisters who chose a much more bloody path.

Eve looked at her brother, who was once again assaulted by the kids who wanted to see his sword in action; the previous conversation had been forgotten...

---///---

*Author note*

Not dead, really.

Sorry for the wait, but because of the work, I have so little time for myself, plus being constantly tired inst helpful at all, with the heat of the recording in our state, I have plenty of work as an AC installer, the problem is, it is too much work that is both tiresome and hard thanks to the blasted sun under which I spent most of my working hours...

So, sorry for the wait, but I just can't find the energy to write; maybe once the heating season ends, I will be able to finally breathe more easily...