Tivwo watched with tears in her eyes as Walter stepped toward the cave. She could tell he looked scared; his shaking hands and tense face gave it away. It scared Tivwo more. For what did it say when the strongest person she knew was scared?

The turtle—Flipper, she recalled—squeaked and placed his head on her knee in assurance. Sobbing, Tivwo picked the creature up in her arms, her tears running down the turtle’s shell like rain on a windshield.

Something else touched Tivwo, and she felt a comforting touch.

“M-mom?” She stammered.

The girl whirled, searching. The feeling was too real to be her imagination.

“Where are you?” she choked out between sobs.

More comfort washed over her, and Tivwo started to understand. The body walking around in the cave wasn’t her mom. Her mom was somewhere here, here with her.

Tivwo knew that if she used the sight--if she scanned the area--she could find her mom. But Turum had always said it was a terrible breach of privacy to scan without approval. Using the sight would show everything about a person, and once you saw the truth of a person, there was no going back.

But Tivwo didn’t care about that right now. She needed to see mom. She needed to know that she was okay. So the young girl opened her eyes.

And Tivwo saw.

Walter stepped back into the cave, the sickly divine energy swirling in place. He flinched as he walked through it, each mote simultaneously a burn and frostbite. It was nothing Walter couldn’t push through, nothing like the choking pain he felt after drowning. And for each speck of energy he touched, a part of him felt stronger for it.

Current Assets

Divine Energy on Hand

265

Total Current Assets:

265

Long-Term (Fixed) Assets

Property, Plant, and Equipment

1250

Total Long-Term (Fixed) Assets:

1250

TOTAL ASSETS:

1515

Owner’s Equity

1500

Retained Earnings

15

Total Equity

1515

His spreadsheet agreed. The small pieces of sick energy that entered Walter were purified and added to his pool. The knowledge empowered Walter, and he walked forward with greater purpose.

He arrived in time to see the two lesser wisps join the greater one in the fight against Tushen. They fought atop a bed of decayed plants, clashing against each other with grunts of pain and howls of anger. Tushen was on the back foot now that the other two joined, but he wasn’t out of the fight yet. The man’s four undead servants fought for him, dispersing the wisps as he attempted to stab their cores with his knife.

Dark circles now ringed Tushen’s eyes, and Walter noticed the man’s body had changed. It was longer now, thinner and wiry as if someone was pulling him taut. His skin hung loosely over his frame, except for a few places that clung tightly to his bones. Horror crept over Walter as he realized the man was burning his soul to put up a fight against the wisps.

The greater wisp had changed throughout the fight as well, but while Tushen looked haggard, the wisp held more form. The grey-black mist had almost solidified into that of a young woman. A dress of red and white formed that ran down to the wisp's ankles. A familiar dress, now that Walter got a good look. The same dress that Turum and Tivwo wore.

The two lesser wisps were solidifying as well, and Walter noticed the resemblance between the three. They lashed out at the skeletons with their stronger bodies, knocking them aside. Bones clattered to the ground, tearing away the last few scraps of cloth on their being.

Walter started to run as the wisps rushed at Tushen with the opening they created. The strange memories from the first wisp attack sprang to his mind. He put two and two together as he ran forward, and the sickening nature of Tushen’s crimes hit him.

These wisps were the man’s earlier victims, and now they had come back to enact their revenge. The three’s anger, sorrow, despair, and other feelings Walter couldn’t name hit him as their claws sank into Tushen’s body and then his soul. Screams of rage like a thousand screeching cicadas erupted from the wisps, halting Walter in his tracks.

He felt the wisps’ satisfaction at the strike, their glee at finally enacting their revenge, and their relief that things were over. But Walter also felt Tushen’s soul and the malicious joy that came after the attack.

The wisps felt something wrong a moment after Walter started moving. The smallest wisp attempted to pull its claw away from Tushen, only to find it stuck. The others noticed as well, and panic began to fill their thoughts. Each wisp pulled, but only the largest could pull free. The two others found their energy seeping out of them; their very being pulled toward Tushen and his sick soul.

Walter could see what would happen soon, a part of him explaining in vivid detail. Tushen’s soul was the same as the sickening divine energy around him, the same power that could take from the world to fuel its rampant growth. The wisps, being souls wrapped in divine energy, were the perfect meal. Tushen’s soul would eat the wisps, stealing their very souls and using them to fuel his sick perversion.

Walter wouldn’t let that pass. He knew what he had to do.

His feet moved before thinking about it, carrying him into the fray. The wisp woman raked him across the back with her claws, thinking Walter was there to attack. Walter flinched but ran on, refusing to stop as memories of the wisp’s pain passed through him. He reached out as he neared the wisps, grabbing their souls in each hand.

Memories of the women’s lives shot through him, clearer than ever before. He saw them growing in the village, their playful lives under the elder, Tushen’s rise to Elder in their teens, and then the man's passes at them later in their twenties. They ignored him at first, as both had set their hearts on another, but Tushen wouldn’t have it. Walter watched in anger as Tushen cornered the women and brought them to the cave.

Fury found Walter, a mix of his indignation and the women’s pain. He released the women and grabbed at Tushen. Tushen made to block with the fishbone knife, but Walter scoffed. His hand changed direction with impossible speed, grabbing Tushen’s wrist and twisting. The familiar burning-frostbite sensation hit Walter, but he gritted his teeth and pushed through the pain.

Tushen cried out, a pitiful wail that sounded like a dying animal. He dropped the knife, and Walter caught it in his other hand.

“No!” Tushen wailed. “That’s mine.”

“Then have it back,” Walter said coldly. He plunged the knife into the man’s chest. Tushen gasped, prepared for the pain, but none came. He looked down to see Walter’s arm plunged halfway into the man’s chest.

Walter himself wasn’t sure what he was doing, only that he knew this would work. The feeling guided him as he completely removed himself from the mortal world and stepped into the world of souls. The knife passed through Tushen’s body harmlessly, for Walter was aiming at something much more important.

Walter brought the knife up to Tushen’s soul and flicked it three times. Each cut severed a connection.

“First, the body,” Walter murmured, unaware of his words.

Tushen’s body crumpled, the man unable to stand. Terror filled his chest, for the man couldn’t understand. He attempted to speak, only to find his lips couldn’t move.

“Then, the heart,” Walter continued.

Tushen’s panic vanished, leaving behind empty rationality. All the man could do was think about how unfair all of this seemed. All he wanted was to have a bit of control in his life.

“Finally, the brain,” Walter intoned.

Tushen’s body slumped to the floor, dead. His soul, however, was very much alive. Walter plucked it from the air, holding it in his hand. The sick divine energy attempted to take him, to drain him of his power. Walter almost laughed. The energy burned away as it attacked Walter, the god letting it happen.

This sick energy was growth in its purest form, a rampant energy that could feed on itself forever like the snake Ouroboros. It would grow and grow, never stopping until the world succumbed.

But Walter was the antithesis. Death and consumption. He was finality, the end of things. Walter was Ragnarok, the Rapture, the earthquake to end the world. He was a god of death, and he burned away the sickness, leaving only pure divine energy in its wake.

Tushen’s memory appeared before Walter as he held the soul. The man saw a young child enamored with his father and the disappointment that came when he couldn’t live up to the man’s standards. Walter watched, a detached participant, as Tushen found a dying fish on the beach. Young Tushen held sway over the fish’s life, and he reveled in the feeling. It was the first time the young child felt he had a sense of control.

Walter saw Tushen’s life pass, the young man growing, finding the small cove and even more animals he could hold sway over. The god saw a pretend king lording over subjects, using them to escape from his restricted life. As Tushen grew, the restrictions lessened, but the man kept his need to retain control.

Then, when Tushen was a young man, Walter saw the beginnings of his perversions. He fell in love with a woman, but she had eyes for another. Tushen’s only way to cope was to retain control. And so Walter continued to watch as the man cornered the woman in his cave on a moonless night.

Walter cut the memory. He could deduce what happened next. The man’s success only reaffirmed his coping mechanism, turning him into the terrible man Walter encountered.

Tushen’s soul squirmed in Walter’s hand, tiny pricks of pain passing to Walter. With a start, Walter realized he’d been crushing the soul in his hand. He quickly stopped, not from any feeling of pity, but because he felt Tushen needed to answer for what he did.

Walter turned to the wisps, holding the soul in his hand. The three women-turned-daemons flinched back. Walter’s eyes were as black as the deep ocean and twice as cold. But, as he looked upon the women, the chill in his eyes abated, replaced by a paradoxical cool warmth.

“I know what he did to you,” Walter said to the women. “I am sorry.”

The two smaller wisps recoiled at the screech of pain and rage from the larger one. Walter felt the rising emotions. What use was his apology after the fact? Words would change nothing! It didn’t fix her pain, nor the sick feeling she held every day of her afterlife! What could he offer besides words?

“I can give closure,” Walter said straightly. “I can help you move to something new, somewhere you could forget about what happened.”

The god opened his domain, showing a glimpse of the glittering pools and their calm solitude. The wisp woman scoffed, but the smaller two looked at the pools. The two younger victims turned to their elder.

A silent conversation passed between the three, the wisp woman growing more upset with every passing moment. Eventually, the three stopped conversing, and the two smaller wisps turned to Walter.

They pushed a wave of acceptance at the god. A wave filled with fatigue. They were tired of being angry, tired of letting the feeling of vengeance control them. If Walter could offer them something more, a way to break away, they would take it.

Walter nodded and ushered them to the pools. The wisp woman screeched, moving between the wisps and Walter’s domain.

“Let them make their choice,” Walter said.

The wisp woman pulled in the surrounding spilled energy Walter hadn’t yet collected, solidifying enough to form a mouth. “No.”

“It’s not your choice to make,” Walter countered.

“And I do not trust you,” the woman rebutted. She spread herself between Walter and the other wisps. “You come here and offer a promise to release them from pain, but I do not know you. You could be worse than that scum in your hands for all I know!”

Walter frowned. He didn’t want to fight this woman. She had had enough pain in her life already. How could he get her to trust him?

The answer came to him quickly, that same feeling that told him how to sever Tushen’s soul. Walter offered his hand and brought up his own pain. “Then, let me earn your trust.”

At first, the wisp woman recoiled, assuming the movement to be an attack. Her form broke apart into mist, shrouding the two smaller wisps. When no attack came, she slowly reformed, wary of any sudden movement. Walter kept still; his hand offered for her to take when she was ready.

Finally, the wisp woman inched forward, still wary of sudden movements. She unfurled a tendril of mist, no larger than a needle, and tapped Walter’s finger. It was enough for a small connection, and Walter used it. He shared his memory of death with the wisp woman, keeping the worst parts as muted as possible.

Walter did understand. He understood the pain, the sick feeling of a life that was no longer his to control, the terror of death, and the coldness that crept into him. He knew that words weren’t enough but that they were all he could offer her.

The woman retreated almost as soon as she touched Walter, but it was long enough for her to receive the memories.

“Please,” Walter said. “Let me help them move on. You and I may not be able to, but they should get the choice.”

Silence hung in the cave, Walter and the woman staring at each other. Then, the woman’s mist retreated with agonizing slowness, as if she were fighting with herself to make the choice. She moved away from the entrance to Walter’s domain, letting the other wisps walk in.

“Thank you,” Walter said.

The woman nodded, watching as the two wisps shed their mist forms on entering the pools. Two young women were left, tired and world-weary. They practically collapsed in the pools, and Walter couldn’t help but smile as he saw their tired frowns curl upward into neutral content.

It would take much longer for the women’s memories to vanish and longer still for them to move on, but it would help.

“Now,” Walter said, looking down at Tushen’s soul. “What about you?”