Abyss Of Truth

Sayid was weightless.

The world had been swallowed by an endless void, its silence deeper than any tomb. Yet the whispers remained—a thousand voices layered upon one another, tangled threads of forgotten words and fractured memories.

He reached for something, anything, but there was nothing to grasp. The sensation of falling was endless, like sinking through time itself.

Then—

A voice. Not the chorus of whispers, but something singular. Familiar.

"Sayid ibn Rahman."

The darkness cracked like shattered glass.

Sayid gasped as his feet struck solid ground. He staggered forward, his breath ragged. A cold wind howled around him, thick with the scent of burning parchment and scorched earth.

He was no longer in the ruins.

Before him stretched an impossible landscape—a vast desert, but unlike any he had known. The sand was black, glimmering like crushed obsidian beneath a sky devoid of stars. A great monolith rose in the distance, its surface etched with the same ancient script from the corridor.

A figure stood at its base.

Tall. Cloaked. Waiting.

Sayid's pulse pounded. He knew this presence. He had felt it long before stepping into the ruins, long before Iskander had spoken his name.

He stepped forward, the sand shifting beneath his boots. The air was thick with something unspoken, something unseen.

As he neared, the figure turned.

Sayid froze.

It was himself.

Or rather, something that bore his face. But where his own eyes burned with determination, this version of him had none. The reflection's gaze was empty, devoid of emotion, as if it had witnessed something beyond comprehension.

"You've come far," the reflection said, voice hollow.

Sayid swallowed hard. "Where am I?"

"The space between knowing and becoming."

The whispers swelled again, curling around him like a serpent. Sayid fought to keep his mind steady.

"What does that mean?"

The reflection lifted a hand. In its grasp was the same book from the ruins, but now, its pages bled ink, the words shifting like living things.

"This is not just knowledge," the reflection murmured. "It is weight. It is fate. It is the burden you have chosen."

Sayid clenched his fists. "I came here for the truth."

The reflection smiled—but it was not warmth, nor mockery. It was sadness.

"Then take it," it said.

The book moved.

No, not moved—reached.

The ink bled from its pages, stretching toward Sayid like tendrils, twisting, grasping. The whispers grew frantic, louder, screaming in a thousand tongues.

Sayid's breath caught. The ink coiled around his wrist, cold and burning at once. His mind reeled, images flashing before his eyes—cities swallowed by shadow, voices crying out in lost languages, a blade dripping red beneath a sunless sky.

A choice.

A burden.

A fate he could not yet understand.

Sayid gritted his teeth. Not yet. Not like this.

With a surge of will, he yanked his arm back. The ink recoiled, snapping away like a severed tether. The whispers shrieked, then fell silent.

The book closed with a resounding thud.

Sayid exhaled, his heart hammering.

The reflection tilted its head.

"You resist," it mused. "Interesting."

Sayid took a shaky step back. "I make my own fate."

The reflection did not argue. Instead, it simply watched. And then—

The world cracked apart.

Light exploded around him, blinding, searing. Sayid's body wrenched backward, his stomach lurching as the abyss shattered—

And then he was falling again.

Only this time—

He was waking up.

---

The Return

Sayid's eyes snapped open.

Cold stone pressed against his back. His chest heaved, his hands trembling. Candlelight flickered overhead.

The ruins.

He was back.

A sharp inhale. Mehri.

Sayid turned his head. She was kneeling beside him, eyes wide with something dangerously close to fear. Her fingers gripped his wrist, as if she'd been checking for a pulse.

"You were gone," she whispered. "I couldn't wake you."

Sayid swallowed. His throat was raw. "How long?"

Mehri hesitated. "An hour."

Sayid's stomach turned. An hour—? It had felt like mere moments.

A slow clap echoed through the chamber.

Sayid's head jerked up.

Iskander stood where he had before, expression unreadable.

"You saw it, didn't you?" the man said.

Sayid pushed himself up, his muscles aching. "Saw what?"

Iskander's gaze darkened. "The weight of what you seek."

Sayid's mind reeled. The book. The reflection. The ink that had nearly consumed him.

He flexed his fingers, expecting to see the inky tendrils still coiled around his wrist. But there was nothing. No mark. No proof.

And yet, something inside him felt different.

He met Iskander's gaze. "Tell me what it means."

Iskander studied him for a long moment. Then he sighed.

"Not yet," he said. "First, you must decide whether you truly want to know."

Sayid exhaled, steadying his resolve. "I wouldn't have come this far if I didn't."

A shadow of something flickered across Iskander's face. Pity? Amusement? Or perhaps… regret.

He nodded toward the book, still resting on the pedestal.

"Then we begin."