Lord of the Foresaken
Chapter 124: Children of Two Worlds

Chapter 124: Children of Two Worlds

The Nullification Protocol had raged for three days before it simply... stopped.

Reed stood in the ruins of what had been the ceremonial grounds, his breath forming crystalline clouds in the unnaturally cold air. Where the void had touched, reality bore scars—not craters or burns, but absences where the very concept of existence had been stripped away. Trees that had never grown cast shadows that had never fallen. People mourned for loved ones whose names they couldn’t remember because those names had never been spoken.

"It’s not over," Lyralei whispered beside him, her hand instinctively moving to her abdomen. "This was just... reconnaissance."

Reed followed her gaze downward, and his breath caught. Beneath her ceremonial robes, barely visible but undeniably present, was the subtle curve of new life.

"That’s impossible," he breathed. "The ceremony was only three days ago."

"Time moves differently when you’re binding dimensions," Lyralei replied, her voice carrying a mixture of wonder and terror. "Reed, I can feel them. Not it—them. There are two."

The revelation should have brought joy, but instead, a chill ran down Reed’s spine. In a universe where their love had painted a target on reality itself, what did it mean to bring children into existence?

As if summoned by their thoughts, the air shimmered, and their alternate selves materialized—but something was different. Where before they had appeared as twisted reflections of power and indifference, now they seemed... diminished. Cracks ran through their forms like fractured glass.

"Congratulations," the alternate Lyralei said, her voice dripping with bitter sarcasm. "You’ve managed to create something even more dangerous than we anticipated."

"The Nullification Protocol withdrew because it detected something unprecedented," the alternate Reed added, his usual smugness replaced by genuine concern. "Your union didn’t just bind your hearts and domains—it created a bridge between dimensional possibilities."

Reed’s hand found Lyralei’s, their fingers intertwining as they faced their darker selves. "What are you trying to tell us?"

"Your children," the alternate Lyralei said, her form flickering like a failing hologram, "will be born with abilities that shouldn’t exist. They’ll be able to manipulate not just dimensional barriers, but the consciousness that perceives those barriers."

"Reality shapers," the alternate Reed clarified. "Born with the power to make their thoughts manifest across multiple dimensions simultaneously."

The implications hit Reed like a physical blow. "You’re saying our children could accidentally rewrite existence?"

"Or intentionally," the alternate Lyralei replied. "Which brings us to why we’re here. The multiverse is watching, Reed. Waiting to see if you’ll make the same mistakes we did."

Before either Reed or Lyralei could respond, their alternate selves began to fade.

"Raise them well," the alternate Reed called out as he dissolved. "Because if you don’t, the next intervention won’t be as gentle as the Nullification Protocol."

Six months later, the reality of their situation had become impossible to ignore.

The children—for they were indeed twins—had begun manifesting abilities before they were even born. Lyralei’s pregnancy had become a diplomatic nightmare as dimensional rifts opened spontaneously around her, each one showing glimpses of realities that responded to her emotional state.

When she was happy, the rifts showed worlds of endless summer. When she was anxious, they revealed battlefields and burning cities. When she was angry—which happened more frequently as her pregnancy progressed—entire alternate timelines seemed to shudder in response.

"We need to build containment protocols," Reed said during an emergency council meeting. Around the table sat representatives from a dozen different realities, all united in their concern about the unborn children’s power.

"Containment?" Lyralei’s voice carried a dangerous edge. "You want to imprison our children before they’re even born?"

"Not imprisonment," clarified Dr. Vex, the chief dimensional theorist they’d recruited from a reality where science had evolved beyond morality. "Education. Guidance. Structure."

"The same structure that turned us into tyrants in other realities?" Lyralei’s anger flared, and the windows of the council chamber suddenly showed scenes of worlds where their children ruled as godlike dictators, reshaping reality according to their whims.

Reed reached across the table, taking her hand. The images in the windows immediately shifted, showing the same children but in different contexts—teaching, healing, protecting the innocent.

"They’re not predetermined to be anything," Reed said quietly. "They’ll be whatever we teach them to be."

But even as he spoke the words, he wasn’t sure he believed them.

The children were born during a convergence of three moons, their arrival heralded by aurora that danced across dimensions. The boy, whom they named Axis, emerged first—his eyes the same steel grey as Reed’s, but with flecks of starlight that seemed to move independently. The girl, Nexus, followed moments later, her gaze a mirror of Lyralei’s amber depths but shot through with veins of liquid silver.

The moment they drew their first breaths, reality hiccupped.

Every dimensional rift within a thousand-mile radius synchronized, showing the same image: the twins as adults, standing hand in hand as they unmade and remade the fabric of existence with casual gestures.

"They’re beautiful," Lyralei whispered, cradling Nexus while Reed held Axis. "And terrifying."

The children’s early development defied every expectation. By three months, they were communicating not through cries or babbling, but through shared dreams that anyone within their vicinity could experience. By six months, they had learned to modulate their reality-shaping abilities, though their control was imperfect.

Axis showed an affinity for dimensional architecture—he could instinctively understand the underlying structures that held realities together. Nexus demonstrated a talent for consciousness bridging—she could make individuals from different realities understand each other’s perspectives without the technological assistance that had been necessary during the union ceremony.

But with their growing abilities came growing dangers.

"We’ve detected seventeen different assassination attempts this week," reported Commander Thex, who had become the head of their security forces after reluctantly accepting the new government. "Three from our own reality, fourteen from alternates."

"They’re children," Lyralei said, exhaustion evident in her voice. She hadn’t slept properly in months, constantly alert to any shift in the dimensional fabric around her babies.

"Children who could theoretically rewrite the laws of physics if they had a particularly vivid nightmare," Reed replied grimly. "We need to establish the academy."

The Confluence Academy had been in development since the twins’ birth—a revolutionary educational system designed to teach beings of immense power how to wield that power responsibly. But it wasn’t just about control; it was about integration.

The academy would bring together children from multiple realities, some with abilities almost as potent as Axis and Nexus, others completely mundane. The goal was to create a generation that understood both the weight of power and the value of limitation.

"Cultural exchange through childhood development," Dr. Vex explained to the assembled faculty—teachers recruited from realities where different approaches to education had evolved. "They’ll learn not just how to control their abilities, but why control matters. Not just how to lead, but how to serve. Not just how to change the world, but when not to."

But as the twins approached their first birthday, new challenges emerged that no educational theory could address.

They had begun dreaming together—shared experiences that created pocket dimensions where the rules of reality bent to accommodate their unconscious desires. These dream-realms persisted after the children woke, becoming semi-permanent additions to the dimensional landscape.

Most concerning of all, they had started showing awareness of their alternate selves across the multiverse. During playtime, Axis would sometimes stop mid-gesture and stare into empty air, as if watching something no one else could see.

"What do you see, little star?" Lyralei asked during one such episode.

Axis looked at her with eyes far too knowing for a child his age. "Other me. Sad me. Mean me. Scared me."

Nexus, playing nearby, nodded solemnly. "Lots of mes. Some nice. Some... not nice."

The implications were staggering. If the children were already aware of their alternate selves across the multiverse, what happened when those alternate selves became aware of them?

The answer came on the twins’ first birthday.

The celebration had been carefully planned—a small gathering with minimal dimensional activity to avoid attracting unwanted attention. But as Reed and Lyralei watched their children blow out candles that flickered across three dimensions, reality began to fracture around them.

Not the controlled rifts they had grown accustomed to, but violent tears in the fabric of existence. Through these wounds stepped figures that made Reed’s blood run cold—alternate versions of Axis and Nexus, but these were not children.

These alternates appeared to be in their twenties, their faces bearing the cruel beauty of beings who had never learned limitations. The alternate Axis wore reality like a cloak, his form shifting between different possible versions of himself. The alternate Nexus stood beside him, her presence causing the air to shimmer with fragments of consciousness torn from other minds.

"Hello, little selves," the alternate Axis said, his voice carrying harmonics that existed in multiple dimensions simultaneously. "We’ve come to offer you a choice."

The real Axis and Nexus, still just toddlers, looked up at their older selves with expressions of perfect calm—as if they had been expecting this moment.

"Join us," the alternate Nexus continued, kneeling down to their level. "Accept what you are truly meant to become. Stop pretending that mortality and morality matter when you have the power to transcend both."

Reed and Lyralei moved to shield their children, but found themselves frozen in place—not by force, but by the simple reality that their alternate children’s mere presence had made movement impossible.

"Or," the alternate Axis said, his tone turning dangerous, "continue this charade of playing house with lesser beings, and face the consequences when the multiverse decides you’re too dangerous to exist."

The real Axis looked up at his alternate self, then at his parents, then at his sister. Some wordless communication passed between the twins—a conversation conducted in dimensions of thought that even Reed and Lyralei couldn’t perceive.

Finally, little Nexus stood up, her tiny hand taking her brother’s.

"No," she said, her voice carrying impossible authority for someone who had only learned to speak months ago. "We choose different."

The alternate versions of themselves smiled—expressions that held no warmth, only predatory amusement.

"Different isn’t an option, little sister," the alternate Nexus replied. "There is only power accepted or power denied. And denied power has a way of finding... unpleasant outlets."

As the alternate children began to fade back into their dimensional rifts, the alternate Axis left them with a final warning:

"The next time we meet, it won’t be a social call. The multiverse is preparing something special for your reality—something that will make the Nullification Protocol look like a gentle caress. And when it arrives, your only choice will be to embrace what you truly are, or watch everything you love burn in the fires of cosmic correction."

The rifts closed, leaving Reed and Lyralei alone with their children in the sudden, terrible silence.

Axis looked up at his father with eyes that held depths no child should possess. "Daddy, are we the bad guys?"

Before Reed could answer, every dimensional monitoring device in New Valdris began screaming in unison. On the screens, a message appeared in languages that predated civilization:

FINAL CONVERGENCE PROTOCOL AUTHORIZEDREALITY DESIGNATION: VALDRIS-PRIMEELIMINATION COUNTDOWN: 7 DAYSCOMPLIANCE IS NOT OPTIONAL

Reed felt Lyralei’s hand slip into his as they stared at the message, both of them knowing that their children’s first birthday had just become the beginning of the end.

"No," Reed whispered, pulling both twins into his arms. "You’re not the bad guys. But the universe seems to think we all are."

Outside, the sky began to bleed.