The Empty World | The Empty World Sequence [complete | rewriting]

"Twenty-Nine" (Draft 2)

The sound of glass shattering. There was really no telling if her scream shattered the glass or the shattering made her scream but Opium was in the middle of it. Morpheus reached her just as the glass showered down on them in glittering shards. He threw his wings up to shield them, but even so glass reached them.

They stood afterward in the darkness lit from below. "Look at me," Opium said, her eyes looked: desperate. She punched and her hand went through Morpheus' skin without breaking it.

"God..." Morpheus moaned.

Opium lifted a hand and touched Morpheus' face, he could barely feel her. He saw her fingertips were red with blood, she brought them to her lips.

Morpheus raised his own hand and felt the piece of glass in his cheek. He lifted it out.

"You're healing slow," Opium said.

"All sorts of bad things happened to me." Morpheus gestured for Opium to follow and went to the window. Los Angeles was rolling toward the storm again now slower with choppy mechanical movements. "Just try t

Opium wound her arms around Morpheus' waist and he closed his wings over them both.

He watched the city close in on the storm. He waited. He felt a tightening in his stomach, but Morpheus waited one more second. And then he flew.

Together and alive. Morpheus looked around. They were standing in Jackson Square. He felt a pang in his stomach as he looked at the cars and clothing. "My stomach hurts, I think we went backward again."

"It looks 22nd century to me...small flights never made you this sick."

Morpheus shook his head. "When we got split up, I was trapped, hitched a ride out of the void, but I ended up future time. I don't think I had completely recovered from being in the void when I came back to find you. I felt like I was actually going to cough up a lung trying to climb the tower!"

"Are you going to be OK? We've got to find Daniel, fast."

"I'm sure I'll live," Morpheus said. He looked about again. "Think we got thrown back a couple days?"

"We'll have to go to Angel's house to find out. But we won't go in. I think that would be bad."

Morpheus checked that River and his Djinn were secure then took one of the good mirrors from his pack. He followed Opium as he tried to focus on Dream. The picture came through. Jibril was laying on his hammock looking so dull and heavy hearted. Absinthe was there.

Jibril reached toward Morpheus. Then Absinthe drew closer. She reached out. Morpheus touched a finger to the mirror. "There was a lot of interference. We've only just gotten to New Orleans."

"Morpheus, you've got to do this. Rocks are falling from Nightfall! Everyone's running to Los Angeles, but it will have to come close to the storm again. And the storm is growing! We've had rain fall in The Land, Morpheus! It was raining fish and birds when the storm last passed the cave! But there's sunlight behind the clouds!"

"Take care of Jibril," Morpheus said. He saw Opium turn around a corner and jogged after her. "Isn't Angel's house up that way?"

"She's got another house...this side of the square, some little street along here, and this is close to where Daniel used to live."