Elizabeth's shriek was the last thing I heard.
I was floating in the abyss, losing track of time, I was a part of the darkness that surrounded me, not sure whether I'd been here seconds or decades ago.
"Why did you attack me, son?"
The deep voice spoke to me from all sides of the darkness, a faceless question that I didn't feel compelled to answer. That wasn't the voice of my dad, anyone else who claimed to be my father can go to hell.
"I see, let me show you the truth then."
I stood exactly where I was before the darkness swallowed me, it was the forest that Elizabeth and I went to at some point in my past, the season was different though, the sun was blazing in the sky and everything looked slightly different without the layer of snow that covered it. I walked aimlessly for a few moments. Then I turned around at the sound of feet stomping the ground, approaching me.
There was a girl who came running as fast as her feet allowed her to, she wore a white cloak that covered her head but her dark hair that was loose got carried out by the wind blowing around her. My heart almost stopped as I finally recognized her face.
"Mom!" I screamed at the top of my lungs, ready to shred whoever was chasing her to pieces.
I ran her way, preparing myself to carry her in my arms and figure out the rest of it later, the woman who gave me life, the woman I thought I buried a month ago, she was right in front of me.
My feet almost gave up, my knees felt loose and mushy. When I finally reached her, her features were wrong, it was mom alright, but why did she look my age?
The horror began when she ran through me. It was the most disturbing thing I had to go through in my entire life.
Pain clutched my heart and squeezed it at the thought that she had died and become a ghost that ran in Anchorage's forests.
Or was it me the one who had died then?
I turned around and chased my mom as she continued running, my heart fell to the ground when she tripped on a tree root that stuck out, she twisted her ankle badly, I tried to grab her and lift her once, twice, three times, but I was not there in the same dimension as her.
I finally fell to my knees next to her.
"Isn't there anyone to help her!" I shouted all the way to heaven or hell.
"There you are," said a deep voice that I came to hate so much in my life previously.
"Stay away from me!" my mother shouted as she crawled, dragging herself when there was nowhere to run.
I launched myself at the man who wore a black cloak again, not placing it over his head this time, but my fist went right through him, his eyes flashed red for a moment, as he bent down and took a hold of her.
"No!" my mother shouted.
"I'll kill you!" I shouted too.
He carried my mother up in his arms and she continued to struggle against him, I was about to lose my mind with the rage that I was feeling for being useless to her right now, but the man I hated so much stood perfectly still after picking her up, he took in every single blow she delivered, and he never attempted to move her.
What was happening here?
I focused on his features, he still looked in his early thirties now too, he had a very patient look on his face, it belonged to old men who had seen it all. His stance wasn't that of a monster who meant my mother harm.
I found myself mirroring his patience automatically.
Both he and I waited some more until my mother's anger subsided, I felt conflicted the moment she stopped struggling against him. Two things happened at the same time.
The hands that were assaulting the man endlessly hugged his neck instead, she pressed her cheek on his chest and nestled in his arms. He finally opened his eyes which were glowing crimson.
"You're mad at me." She sniffled.
"Silly little girl, I'm only mad you hurt yourself." His face was unreadable, I couldn't make up my mind on whether he was lying or telling the truth.
"This pain is nothing in comparison to what you did to me, Arthur... How could you ask to see Elena of all people, when you know how things are between us?"
"Elena had her coming-of-age ceremony already, you know the time to produce an heir is approaching." He said.
"Don't you dare try to convince me that you can't wait two more years for me!" She shouted and hit him some more, he closed his eyes again, not once did he ask her to stop.
I stood there, perplexed.
The scenery started changing around me, I was in the same forest but it was nighttime, and the person that passed me by this time was the person I longed most to see. He strode toward the man my mother called Arthur, looking a bit younger as well here.
He was the spitting image of Liam.
His strides suddenly became more urgent as he launched himself at Arthur, grabbing him by his black cloak, exactly the way I did right before this dimension sucked me in.
Arthur wore a stoic expression again, the two men were both huge, and no one dominated the other physically. They looked like day and night.
They looked like the perfect rivals.
"Why do you keep sending her my way!" He was snarling, not once in my life had I seen this expression on him.
"I do not send her your way; she chooses to lean against you each time I give her a fact check." The other guy said. Finally pushing my father's hands off of him.
"A fact check? Is that what they called rejection back when dinosaurs walked the earth?" My father said mockingly. I recognized this attitude too well, it was how he got when someone upset my mother.
"It is simply where each of us stands in the tabooed world, the little girl simply needed to know her place." He said coldly, reminding me of Elizabeth all of a sudden.
"She had her ceremony days ago and you never asked for…" My dad's face was red, his arms were shaking and he struggled with his choice of words.
"I will call her when the time is right, she needs to live her life meanwhile, in a parallel line, if you may." He didn't bother waiting for my father to get it together.
"P-parallel? PARALLEL? Her life is a fricking circle and you're in the middle of it!" My father threw his hands in the air, then ran both of them through his hair.
My father, and the man who called me son.
In this time and space, they looked like two friends who were both concerned for my mother, each in his own way.